What is an Original Cinema Lobby Card?

Originating in 1910s America, cinema lobby cards were created for the promotion of the latest cinematic releases and prominently displayed in the lobbies of movie palaces. Printed on heavy card stock paper, the standard size of a lobby card measures 11"x14", though for a short time a smaller size measuring in at 8"x10" was also created.

Due to limitations in large scale photographic printing, the lobby cards served to accompany film posters, which at the time featured hand-painted designs by artists, rather than photography.

Like all paper ephemera, the value in these artworks wasn’t realised at the time. The lobby card died out by the 1970s due to advances in photo-reproduction seeing developments in the film poster. This meant that the lobby card was already obsolete by the time the collector’s market took off, making the ones that survive today all the more rare, and highly collectible.