This summer, the Yale Center for British Art is presenting the exhibition Art for All: British Posters for Transport.  The show is based around Henry S. Hacker’s collection of promotional posters designed in the primarily 1930s for the London Underground and British Railway system.  The works are exceptional examples both of poster design and of a successful and culturally significant promotional campaign.

    Along with the exhibition, the Center is showing a variety of films connected to the British rail and Underground.  They range from shorts from the 1930s to a 1970s horror film.  One film, Night Mail, documents the night mail train between London and Glasgow, with narration written by the poet W.H. Auden.  Here’s the clip from the film with the reading of W.H. Auden’s poem “Night Mail:”

To see more of the posters that spark this interest in the British rail system, check out the accompanying catalogue, edited by Teri J. Edelstein.