I’m a college student. I have a room (not in a dorm - my very own!) and also an office. Both have blank, white walls.
Basically, I’m looking for recommendations on good posters I can buy to put on the walls (hopefully, posters that I can order online).
I don’t know of any good Objectivist-themed posters, so those would be most welcome. Also, anything Romantic art-related. Or just what any of you find appealing - from what I’ve gathered, most regular participants on this forum have very good taste. B)
If anyone has any suggestions, please make a post! Even if some of the suggestions aren’t ideal for me, they may come in handy for some other college-aged people on this forum.
Also, if anyone has any good advice on cheaply decorating rooms in general, let us know. (Unfortunately, I can’t afford prints of the sort Sophia has linked to several times - yet).
My room has a House MD poster, and a James Blunt one. It would have a Rush one, but the prices were ridiculous at their concert.
As for cheaply decorating rooms, I have about a zillion pictures up on the wall, all taken with a disposable camera. Total cost: about 10 dollars. Its nice to walk in and see my friends smiling faces looking at me.
I glanced at Rush posters online. They weren’t expensive (so you might look there), but I didn’t see any I particularly liked. (Though many have probably been made over the years, so I’m not counting them out.)
I guess I’m probably more likely to find affordable “art” posters than other kinds of posters. “Affordable” being under $100 and hopefully under $50. (And hopefully even less than that.)
My friends are far too ugly to put pictures of them on the walls. (Just kidding! B) )
P.S.: The cheap Rush posters I found were at Amazon.com.
I’ve got the Scarface dollar poster. It’s got Tony Montana where the historical, American figure should be and at the top instead of " God We Trust " it says " I Trust Me ".
Go to a decent art gallery and see what prints they have there. Your best bet is probably one of the big ones that commonly have people milling through just to look, because they likely have retail counters. Even today modern art galleries still keep good 19th century art as prints. I have a few prints that I got from AGNSW at the Domain in Sydney, which cost me about US$20-25 each or so, then had block-mounted.
Also, some pictures available online might be at a high enough resolution to print - though I don’t know what the cost of that would be. Try Quent Cordair or Brian Yoder. If you can’t get good enough pics then at least they will also give you plenty of selections to drool over B) Quent (or the website) could also help you with further suggestions?
I honestly like John’s idea the most. I might do that myself. I also will get a Rush poster, probably Moving Pictures. Honestly though, I always kinda liked the idea of a Dagny style room.
John, finding a good art gallery is a good idea. I don’t have time to do that right now, but sometime in the future I hopefully will do that. There are probably some great, inexpensive pieces in the state Museum of Art, too (I remember seeing them before), so that’s another place I’ll look for actual art.
As for finding high-res pics online to print - it seems that most artists do not provide hi-res images, and that’s probably the reason they don’t. Of course, that’s probably illegal, anyway, at least if I’m understanding you correctly.
Quin - If by Dagny style room, you mean with a view of NYC and some expensive furniture, I’m totally in agreement, though I’ll have to wait. Question: What is your conception of a Dagny style room? And, is Dagny included or does she have to be “purchased” separately?
As for finding high-res pics online to print - it seems that most artists do not provide hi-res images, and that’s probably the reason they don’t. Of course, that’s probably illegal, anyway, at least if I’m understanding you correctly.
Surely the good 19th and early 20th century ones are all waaaay out of copyright now. But yes, you’re right about the newer material.
Just had another thought while writing another post (I should have remembered this after seeing Egoist’s and Kufa’s specific recommendations)…
Go to a bunch of video rental stores and see if you can get slightly dated posters of good movies you liked. They’re big, glossy, and CHEAP! The local Video Ezy outlet has them on sale for $A1 each, for example. Some may be a bit tattered, but either you can live with that (librarians’ magic tape works wonders) or spend a lot of time looking for ones in better condition. Precisely because they are cheap, you can replace them regularly and their presence will give your room that authentic poor-college-student look. Any good quality posters of classics can be block-mounted at your leisure, eg Metropolis is a favourite for this.
For a college dorm room, nothing beats Pink Floyd’s Back Catalogue. My wife, quite understandably, disapproves of it, so it is no longer hanging in my bedroom.
However, if you want something a bit more sophisticated, you could always go with Leutze’s Washington Crossing the Delaware. That’s what is currently gracing the space above my TV. It’s a bit pricey though.
I have a favorite artist gallery on my website that are mostly along the lines of romantic realism.
I’m not really sure about linking to it in this forum due to the rule about linking to commercial sites, but others have mentioned allposters.com and amazon.com, as well as a link to a commercial gallery regarding Steve Hanks and the Quent Cordair gallery, so here is the link:
On a completely different tack, you might check out Despair.Com, home of the Demotivators. They do brilliant parodies of those stupid business motivation posters. I’m fond of “Idiocy”, “Incompetence”, “Mediocrity”, “Pretension”, “Sacrifice (Temple)” and “Success”. “Pretension” is explicitly identified as perfect for Objectivists.
Being cynical about the widespread idiocy in modern culture probably helps a lot in finding these amusing. The basic style of humor is Dilbertian; if you like Dilbert, you’ll probably like these. If not, not.
Quin - If by Dagny style room, you mean with a view of NYC and some expensive furniture, I’m totally in agreement, though I’ll have to wait. Question: What is your conception of a Dagny style room? And, is Dagny included or does she have to be “purchased” separately?
My conception of a Dagny style room has always been relatively empty with the exception of a few pieces of furniture that I find attractive and a few aesthetics.
I just bought a poster the other day at Target. Its a picture of a bunch of rocks stacked to look like a person and it says: “Life isn’t about finding yourself, but about creating yourself.”