The 2024 posters look great – a richly immersive composition of micro-elements that feel like a Where’s Wally frame that’s been commissioned by Jay Gatsby. Have a look for yourself…
ADVERTISEMENTThe posters for the Olympic and Paralympic Games Paris 2024 have been unveiled at the Musée d’Orsay in Paris.
“It’s a new, key moment in the Paris 2024 story,” said Paris 2024 president Tony Estanguet at the event. “We’ve tried to be different and imagine posters that look like us, posters that go beyond a mere logo.”
Probably best, since they already fluffed it up with the clitoris mascot… Thankfully, the posters look great – a richly immersive composition of micro-elements that feel like a Where’s Wally frame that’s been commissioned by Jay Gatsby, in which viewers can discover new details with every glance.
Paris 2024 hired French illustrator Ugo Gattoni, known for his vibrant style, to design the posters. He spent a reported total of 2,000 hours creating the two posters that will represent the Olympic and Paralympic Games Paris 2024.
They present a sort of Art Deco fantasy utopia of Paris, in which familiar monuments (the Eiffel Tower, the Seine, the Arc de Triomphe…) and symbols are present within a cheerful and colourful landscape – one which echoes the games’ slogan “Games Wide Open”.
“Ugo is known for his colourful, fun universe,” added Estanguet. “We needed that universe. It was important that these posters could live by themselves, separately – one Olympic poster and one Paralympic – but also that they could live together.”
Indeed, in the spirit of equality, Paris 2024 chose not to make a distinction between the Olympics and Paralympics in the design of the official posters. They are presented as a diptych – seen independently but also grouped together.
“It’s an incredible opportunity to have my work shown to the world, it’s great,” said Gattoni. “It’s very important to me that a piece of art has a life in its own time, so it is absolutely fantastic that this drawing can be shown in a museum alongside paintings that are hundreds of years old.”
Paris 2024 director of design Joachim Roncin, who nine years ago invented the “Je suis Charlie ” slogan, said: “It was very important to work with Ugo because he’s a manual artist, he works with his hands. Nothing is digital assisted. Today we live in the world where there is a lot of AI. I wanted to bring this savoir-faire à la française (French know-how); to do these hand-drawn posters and colours as well, with the hand.”
The posters will remain at the Musée d’Orsay in Paris until 10 March, and will appear on billboards all over Paris from today.
