Tart Cards

Rating:
Summary: A Curious Volume Proves It Pays to Advertise
Review: Marshall McLuhan wrote that advertising was the cave art of the twentieth century. He wasn't around to see a particularly interesting manifestation of the cave art in London starting in 1984. At that time, because of a loophole in the law, London prostitutes started advertising in phone boxes. The practice became so prominent that now a book reproducing hundreds of the cards, along with a brief documentation of the history and sociology of the practice, has been produced: _Tart Cards: London's Illicit Advertising Art_ (Mark Batty Publisher), by Caroline Archer, is a surprising and good-looking examination of the legal, social, commercial, and advertising issues involved in the cards, as well as an amusing collection of cards offering many different sexual practices. If you can't spend time in a London phone box, this book will take you there.

Advertising in phone boxes, which belonged to the Post Office and thus the government, was illegal until 1984, when British Telecom was privatized. Enterprising prostitutes saw the loophole and moved their cards from news agents to phone boxes; after all, each card sported a telephone number, and it made sense to advertise where potential clients could use it immediately. Sometimes the women place their own cards, but they more often subcontract this work to "carders," often students or unemployed. Placing 600 cards a day might get a carder 200 pounds; thus mere card distribution is a trade of millions of pounds per year. Catherine Archer has her doctorate in typography, and is especially interested in the typefaces of the cards. A historic typeface from the nineteenth century tends to be used for cards offering mock schoolgirl services or flagellation. Massage services often have whimsical and feminine scripts. Domination cards can have "stern words set in Gothic letters."

Archer is not the only person enthusiastic about the cards in their own right. Cards are traded, like Pokemon cards, and sometimes children do the trading. Some collectors are quite serious in appreciation of the cards' artistic merit or social significance. There have even been parodies of cards, used to promote tours of musical acts or to protest aspects of the use of public spaces. Archer has produced a very interesting examination of the phenomenon, but the best parts of the book are the pages and pages of reproductions of cards, all in full color and unexpurgated. "Have you been a naughty boy?" enquires a professorial-looking woman with a cane. "If you're feeling rather randy, always keep this number handy!" exults one, or "Sticks and stones may break my bones, but whips and chains excite me." There are even variants for Christmas: "Have a Cruel Yule." This is an amusing and handsome book, on an esoteric subject which the author has made interesting and pertinent. Try it on your coffee table.

Rating:
Summary: A Curious Volume Proves It Pays to Advertise
Review: Marshall McLuhan wrote that advertising was the cave art of the twentieth century. He wasn't around to see a particularly interesting manifestation of the cave art in London starting in 1984. At that time, because of a loophole in the law, London prostitutes started advertising in phone boxes. The practice became so prominent that now a book reproducing hundreds of the cards, along with a brief documentation of the history and sociology of the practice, has been produced: _Tart Cards: London's Illicit Advertising Art_ (Mark Batty Publisher), by Caroline Archer, is a surprising and good-looking examination of the legal, social, commercial, and advertising issues involved in the cards, as well as an amusing collection of cards offering many different sexual practices. If you can't spend time in a London phone box, this book will take you there.

Advertising in phone boxes, which belonged to the Post Office and thus the government, was illegal until 1984, when British Telecom was privatized. Enterprising prostitutes saw the loophole and moved their cards from news agents to phone boxes; after all, each card sported a telephone number, and it made sense to advertise where potential clients could use it immediately. Sometimes the women place their own cards, but they more often subcontract this work to "carders," often students or unemployed. Placing 600 cards a day might get a carder 200 pounds; thus mere card distribution is a trade of millions of pounds per year. Catherine Archer has her doctorate in typography, and is especially interested in the typefaces of the cards. A historic typeface from the nineteenth century tends to be used for cards offering mock schoolgirl services or flagellation. Massage services often have whimsical and feminine scripts. Domination cards can have "stern words set in Gothic letters."

Archer is not the only person enthusiastic about the cards in their own right. Cards are traded, like Pokemon cards, and sometimes children do the trading. Some collectors are quite serious in appreciation of the cards' artistic merit or social significance. There have even been parodies of cards, used to promote tours of musical acts or to protest aspects of the use of public spaces. Archer has produced a very interesting examination of the phenomenon, but the best parts of the book are the pages and pages of reproductions of cards, all in full color and unexpurgated. "Have you been a naughty boy?" enquires a professorial-looking woman with a cane. "If you're feeling rather randy, always keep this number handy!" exults one, or "Sticks and stones may break my bones, but whips and chains excite me." There are even variants for Christmas: "Have a Cruel Yule." This is an amusing and handsome book, on an esoteric subject which the author has made interesting and pertinent. Try it on your coffee table.