FACE 1958 Ingmar Bergman Max von Sydow Peter Strausfeld UK QUAD POSTER

Original British 30 inch x 40 inch Quad Poster for the 1958 Ingmar Bergman Drama THE FACE (THE MAGICIAN)(ANSIKTET) starring Max von Sydow, Ingrid Thulin, Gunnar Björnstrand, Naima Wifstrand, Åke Fridell, Lars Ekborg, Bengt Ekerot, Toivo Pawlo, Erland Josephson, Gertrud Fridh and Bibi Andersson.

With The Magician, an engaging, brilliantly conceived tale of chicanery that doubles as a symbolic portrait of the artist as a deceiver, Ingmar Bergman proved himself to be one of cinema’s premier illusionists. Max von Sydow stars as Dr. Vogler, a nineteenth-century traveling mesmerist and peddler of potions whose magic is put to the test in Stockholm by the cruel, eminently rational royal medical adviser Dr. Vergérus (Gunnar Björnstrand). The result is a diabolically clever battle of wits that’s both frightening and funny, shot by Gunnar Fischer in rich, gorgeously gothic black and white.

The poster art is by Peter Strausfeld. Strausfeld was interned in the Isle of Man at the Onchan Internment Camp during the War where he met the Austrian producer George Hoellering. In 1947 Hoellering opened the Academy Cinema on Oxford Street and invited Strausfeld to produce some posters for the cinema which he did in wood and lino-cuts till his death in 1980.

The Academy Cinema, built in 1913, was saved from conversion to a shopping arcade in 1928 by Elsie Cohen of the original Film Society, who proceeded to run it as an arthouse which is how it was ran till it's closure in 1986.

The posters became a London landmark, in fact very few were used outside of London, resulting in very small print runs of 3-500.

The posters became a London landmark, in fact very few were used outside of London, resulting in very small print runs of 3-500.

The poster, printed by The Westminster Press, is in very good folded condition.