JIM DIETZ VINTAGE POSTERS

1011, 4010 GALT OCEAN DR, FORT LAUDERDALE, FL 33308

To go directly to the links to my poster pages, skip these next 3 paragraphs of my biography.

In the late 1970’s in San Diego in my 30’s, my wife and I began collecting American movie memorabilia including fan magazines, stills and posters. By the early 1980’s we were movie memorabilia dealers and sold at all of the collectible shows in the Southern California area. We bought, sold and traded at these shows and also with in the pages of Movie Collectors World. We opened a poster store in San Diego called Cinemania. In 1982 and in 1985 I compiled and published the first price guide to American movie posters, Price Guide and Introduction to Movie Posters and Movie Memorabilia (1982/1985). This book was a big success and gave me credibility as an appraiser and auction expert. My “15 minutes of fame” came in the late 1980’s when I journeyed to Alberta and appraised the now famous Royal Theater Collection for a Canadian court. I also supervised the auction of that collection of near mint 1930’s posters and the auction realized for the court a sum 100 times greater than they had originally estimated. Today’s expression “Canadian mint” refers to a poster in absolute mint condition and that expression originated with my appraisal of the Royal Theater Collection. In the late 1980’s I established the first primitive poster web site on the Internet. A short time later I started selling on the early EBay at the time when EBay was known for selling mainly Beanie Babies and crashing frequently.

In the mid 1980’s while on a “book tour” for my price guide in Europe, I fell in love with France and with the French posters of American movies. By the late 1980s and early 1990’s I was visiting France a half dozen times a year and buying French movie posters at auctions and selling them in the United States at poster shows and on my web site. The dollar was strong against the French franc and the very different French artwork appealed to the American movie poster collector. Business boomed. By the mid 1990’s I was disenchanted with what I considered inferior American poster artwork and soon I was specializing only in French movie posters. I was fortunate in that the French movie poster dealers were slow to embrace the Internet as a marketing device. For a few years I had the web to myself as far as French movie posters were concerned. But not for long. Today there are just as many French based movie poster web sites as there are American poster sites. The competition with my French dealer friends and the declining value of the dollar slowed my sales. Soon, I was getting bored with the French movie posters of American films. Some of them were truly exquisite but there were only 50 or so titles that were easy to sell, so I stopped chasing those same titles and moved into another poster direction- vintage French posters- any subject, except the movies.

In the mid 1990’s I purchased a flat in Paris because I was spending a lot of time in Paris going to auctions, poster and paper shows, flea markets and visiting my competitors. Waiting on many metro platforms, I became intrigued by the magnificent artwork on some of the huge publicity poster facing me. The fashion and department store posters and posters advertising art gallery exhibits were especially attractive. By 2003, I had forgotten French movie posters and I turned exclusively to modern and vintage French advertising posters: fashion, wine, tourism, aviation, rail, cabaret, jazz and music, products, gallery etc. By 2005 I had sold my entire inventory of movie posters. I was now simply a French poster dealer. Initially, business was very good but with the further erosion of the dollar, the American distrust of things French because of the Bush wars and today’s decline in consumer spending, my poster business has slowed. Today, I still buy selectively on the Internet and in person in France. I travel to Paris less often but I maintain my flat that I rent when I am not using it. CLICK HERE for information. I have also moved from San Diego to Fort Lauderdale and to a small studio in the French Quarter in New Orleans where things French are still celebrated. I have been around long enough to know that every business has its season, as every life does. Things change. I could be approaching the beginning of the end. Who knows? I am not exactly at the end of my tether but I can see its end far off in the distance. This could be the last revision of my web site. Naturally, I have a few regrets but I am enjoying each day as it unfolds because how we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives.

So much for my 40 years in posters in three paragraphs! The links to all of my web pages are below. The posters are mainly French, but I have included many vintage American publicity and movie posters from my personal collection. The poster images are not to scale and some of the images do not show the borders. However, posters have not been trimmed. E-Mail me for specific size, condition and availability. Unless linen backed, most folded posters ship for $10 in the USA and Canada and $20 elsewhere. I accept Paypal or a check denominated in US dollars. I do fee appraisals of all movie posters and movie memorabilia both American and foreign and of vintage French publicity posters. I still buy collections and I take on an occasional consignment. I have a good reputation worldwide and I have a 99.8% positive feedback on EBay after more than a decade on that site.

Here I am somewhere in France relaxing.

And here is the first French publicity poster I bought in the late 1980’s- 47”x63” a poster for Printemps Department store aimed at the tourist trade with an unusual twist, some of the text in English. I still have one or two for sale!