BOSTON, MA.- International Poster Gallery presents Proto-Pop: The Elegant Object, a first-of-its-kind exhibition of original vintage Object Posters from the Twenties to the 1940’s, offered as precursors to the controversial and explosive Pop Art movement of the 1960s and 1970s. The exhibition, featuring over 30 posters from Object Poster masters, explores the points where the two movements converge, as well as contrast. Featuring hyper-realistic drawings of everyday things, the Swiss Object Poster beginning in the Twenties focused on the beauty and precision of mundane industrial era products such as toothpaste, sunglasses, sneakers and household cleaners. These startling, larger-than-life advertisements foreshadowed by decades Pop Art’s similar fascination with basic consumer products. Both styles elevate the commonplace object to a level of symbolism that elicits both shock and contemplation from the viewer. Though they display similar iconography, the Object Poster exalts the almost magical beauty of the object, while Pop Art uses the consumer object as an ironic symbol of rebellion.