Posters celebrating the effort of Britain and its allies in the Second World War have become familiar images in Western popular culture. But how was the war reported from the perspective of the other side?
20 January 2022
THE CHURCHILL OCTOPUS
c.1941, a Vichy France World War II propaganda poster
£4,000-5,000
Our Out of the Ordinary sale on 15-16 February includes a chromolithograph propaganda poster published in occupied Paris by the Vichy government in 1942.
Signed with a monogram of the artist ‘SPK’, it depicts Winston Churchill as an octopus with its tentacles representing British military intervention in the Middle East and Africa.
The text reads Confiance... Ses Amputations Se Poursuivent Methodiquement (Have Faith – The Systematic Amputations Are Continuing).
The desire was to spotlight the areas of conflict that existed between Vichy French forces and the British and the Free French. The cutting of these tentacles reflects the thwarting of British actions in Norway, Germany, Syria, Somalia, Libya, Mers el Kebir and Dakar by Axis forces.
This well known but rare image is guided at £4,000-5,000.
We are excited to bring a particularly rare piece of Murano glass to auction. This daring example of Dino Martens’s work will be offered on Tuesday 13 October in The Glass Sale.
18 September 2026
Here, close friend, art historian and former Senior Curator of Modern British Art at Tate, Andrew Wilson, offers an insight into James Birch’s remarkable collection and the extraordinary life behind it. Having known James since the late 1980s, Andrew has witnessed first-hand his restless curiosity, his friendships with artists and his instinct for the unusual.
15 September 2026
Discover the story behind two rare photographs of Martin Luther King Jr. and Lal Bahadur Shastri, exploring their historic meeting in London, and the significance of the original colour film.
8 September 2026