Olympic posters

Totally agree yogagran ...I couldn't believe what I was looking at ...especially the "3 year old finger painting" one.

These are the things the world will judge us on next year ...awful is too kind a word for them.

I dread to think what the 'Opening ceremony' is going to be like ...cringe making no doubt!

i thought the thread was about us having some Olympic posters on here..silly me!

Oh dear oh dear. It is difficult to know what they are going to look like with added text... I am bemused. After the logo and the mascots... did nobody tell them that if you want to sell cute mascot toys they need TWO EYES. Fundamental bit of human psychology.
These posters are all over the place aren't they. Not much London and not a lot of olympics involved. No brief given maybe? Short rude word.
I guess it will all be a raging success despite the logo, mascots and posters. i hope.

I think the artists are frankly taking the p... and laughing all the way to the bank

I think the king is in the all together, the all together, as naked as the day that he was born…

The Bridget Riley one is just 'a Bridget Riley'; nothing about it says 'Olympic Games'. I like the Sarah Morris, Michael Craig Martin and Fiona Banner ones. Tracey Emin's is just rubbish [as ever]. There was a lovely Olympic poster in Next that I liked; it was very retro, like an old advertising poster [which I assume it was!]. As for the logo; words fail me...let's design something cuddly for kids and adults alike; I know, a cyclops would be perfect...

..at least the Chris Ofili [sp] one didn't have his customary elephant poo on it [breathes sigh of relief...]

Oh dear - it all sounds awful. Thank goodness I'm indifferent to sport in all its forms. (Which would probably endanger my Australian citizenship if they found out...)

And they want to charge £7.00 per poster for this ? unbelieveable my little DGS could do better,in fact he has done better.

I too am pretty indifferent to sport for myself (watch a bit of Wimbledon, that is all) and have huge reservations about the cost of the olympics and the security issues.
But now I just feel embarrassed - the mascot (what is this thing? - what madman chose it?) - and now the posters. The international community will think we have completely lost our marbles!

Its easy to rubbish modern art but I like them. I Particularly like the Howard Hodgkins, Bridget Riley and Chris Ofili posters, the others are okay, even Tracey Emin's. I agree they don't immediately make me think of the Olympic Games but on closer inspection they do. eg Bridget Rileys lines running across the page or what I really like is the swimmer in the swirl of blue in the Howard Hodgkins poster - think I might buy this one.

No particular objection myself to them as single pieces (but i don't "get" Emin... publicist extraordinare...?) or objection to "modern art". Big fan of Anish Kapoor for instance.

There is just nothing very olympic-values-y or olympic-y about them is there? A bit "here's one i made earlier, that would do" ?

So true JessM ... they do not leap out as London Olympics

I haven't taken a lot of notice of who they were by, but I quite like the blue one, which does look a bit like a swimmer underwater. As modern art, they may have something to say. As Olympic posters, they are meaningless.

Just thought that I should perhaps add this link for anyone having trouble finding the pictures:

www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-15577818

Don't mind numbers 1,4,8,9,10,11
Not impressed by the rest.
Nothing screamed great at me - I think the above numbers were adequate.

I guess I have damned them with faint praise, haven't I?

I think the real issue is that posters have a purpose, so these should be saying a) Olympics b) London c) 2012 and, generally speaking, these don't. Posters are different from pure art. Some of them seem to have at least some connection with a), b) or c) and some are pleasing to look at – but is that enough? I agree with you Mishap about the bizarre mascots.

I find the Olympics completely irrelevant to me and my family.
None of us ever watches sport on television or plays any. As a rural family busy with country life and tasks we are physically too tired to need to play sport.
We live in the North of Scotland and it would be far too expensive to travel to even Glasgow to watch the sports and to stay overnight.I dont think even the torch relay comes within 250 miles of us.
I am dreading a summer of television /radio dominated by Olympic hype.

We're the same, Toria. My interest, in this matter, is in the artwork only.

I used to swim cycle and hike, and have watched bits of the Tour de France because of the vistas you see, as much as anything. Mind you, when I see a cyclist suffering on the hill climbs, I feel what they are going through, having cycled in the hills of Yorkshire for many years.

Generally though, watching any sport bores me rigid. We make sure we hire lots of DVDs to watch during the Olympics, because the saturation coverage here is nauseating on many levels. This is Australia, where sport is the national religion, and I'm not religious!!

I would like to ask ,who is paying for these posters, tHE long suffering public again I think they are diabolical how embarassing when overseas visitors get to see them. they will think we couldn't afford anything good so we got pre school kids to paint them. Up here In Sunny Lincolnshire we have always felt cut off from all things Olympic , after seeing these I'm glad

We are paying for the whole of the Olympics not just the posters. The bankers should pay I say.

I really don't understand why the Olympics couldn't have been spread over the country and not just in [yawn] London, as ever. Being such a small country I bet Games that have been held in places such as America have covered an area much wider than us.

It is spread a bit. The sailing is not in London and neither is the rowing.

Olympics - does every announcement fill you with dread?

Well it is beginning to! ...latest?

They've removed HMS Belfast from the posters that have gone up around London!!

Some young thing ...sitting in an office ...it got in the way of the writing!!

Excuse me??