The 1936 Winter Carnival poster, designed by Dwight Clark Shepler, recently made Dartmouth history as the second highest selling Winter Carnival poster in history. The poster sold for $7,200 almost double its estimated value during a Feb. 4 auction at Swann Auction Galleries, a major auction house in New York City.
During its annual Vintage Poster auction, Swann auctioned 11 Winter Carnival posters dated 1936 to 1961 and two Dartmouth Outing Club skiing posters, Gwendolyn Rayner, a specialist at Swann Galleries, said.
Many Winter Carnival traditions have come and gone during its almost 100-year history, yet the annual Carnival poster has remained the face of the February weekend for almost 80 years. Winter Carnival posters which have varied tremendously in artistic style but typically feature iconic images of skiers, ice skaters and other gleeful students are coveted collectors items today.
The 1938 Winter Carnival poster sold for a record-breaking $7,800 in 2008, according to Rayner.
This year, Brenton Rayner '10, a physics major and digital arts minor and Gwendolyn Rayner's brother, beat out eight other entries with his poster design a Roman centurion skiing down a mountain according to Brian Dye, assistant director of Collis Center and student activities.
Brenton Rayner said that this year's Carnival theme, "I Came, I Saw, I Carnivaled," was "rough" and "not as open-ended" as last year's theme "Summiting a Century: 100 Years of the DOC" for which he submitted the runner-up poster design.
Brenton Rayner said he settled on a "throwback" art-deco design that reflects classic Winter Carnival prints but also incorporates the "arts and crafts" style of designs in recent years.
Brenton Rayner's design uses watercolors, pencils and milk paint.
The tradition of the Winter Carnival poster dates back to 1911, when the first poster, designed by Walter Humphries '14, depicted a skier mid-jump above evergreen trees.
After 1911, students did not design Winter Carnival posters again until a school-wide poster competition began in 1932. Since 1966, each poster has reflected the Winter Carnival theme, according to College archivist Peter Carini.
Dartmouth recently partnered with University Press of New England to produce a coffee-table book of high-resolution photographs of every Winter Carnival poster, Carini said.
The book, which will be available this fall, will feature essays about the posters and details about the artists and printing mediums, he said.
"The posters reflect 70 years' worth of graphic design," Carini said.
The College has copies of almost every Winter Carnival poster in Rauner Special Collections Library, Carini said.
"You can really see how people's aesthetic design has changed. [The posters] are very representative of their times," he added.
Rauner does not have records of posters from the years of World War II, when many of College traditions lost precedence to global events and posters were not printed.
Winter Carnival posters are now collector's items for both Dartmouth alumni and poster enthusiasts, according to now-retired poster dealer and former Lebanon, N.H. resident Dennis Jette.
Although he no longer sells posters full-time, Jette continues to sell posters on eBay.com and on request from potential buyers.
"The main attraction is it's poor-man's art," Jette said.
Jette said he usually sells original copies of Winter Carnival posters to alumni, who often hope to acquire posters from the years they attended Dartmouth.
Prices for posters can range anywhere from $15 to thousands of dollars, with an average price of $40, according to Jette. The most sought-after posters include those with art-deco designs from the 1940s and 1950s.
"If I can get an early one, I will sell it in a heartbeat," Jette said.
The most popular Winter Carnival poster is the 1992 "How the Grinch Stole Carnival" poster, which features classic characters created by Theodore Geisel '25 and is very hard to acquire, Jette said.
Although posters are still in high demand, the "craze" for Winter Carnival posters peaked about 10 years ago, Jette said.
Since then, the relative ease of putting old posters up for auction on eBay.com or checking prices with the Antiques Roadshow has forced prices down.
Posters are also now sold at antique shows and at auction houses in New York and London. Some posters have sold for over $6,000 at Sotheby's in London, according to Jette,
During Swann's Vintage Poster auction, all but two of the Winter Carnival posters up for auction were sold, and the remaining posters could be bought up in after-sales, Gwendolyn Rayner said.
Private collectors, rather than poster dealers, bought most of the posters, a shift that can be attributed to poor economic conditions, she said.
Swann Galleries often acquires posters from individuals who find them in their attics, Rayner said. In order to preserve the posters, Swann mounts them on linen.
"It's pretty amazing they actually survived," Rayner said. "They weren't meant to be saved."
This year's poster was sold in Collis Commonground to students and community members for $5 to commerate the 2010 Winter Carnival.
