Modern Treads: The Discount Tire Poster Collection

ABOUT THE EXHIBITION

Modern Treads: The Discount Tire Poster Collection presents 15 oversized posters from approximately 1900 to 1930 that celebrate industrial innovation and the growing popularity of the automobile. Following the urbanization of Paris, industry giants such as Michelin, Dunlop, Continental, Pirelli, and Goodyear followed the footsteps of talented lithographers and recognized posters as an effective form of communication. Drawn exclusively from the Collection of Discount Tire, the posters trace both artistic innovation and industrial transformation.

Header: Bordio, Goodyear, c. 1930. Color lithograph on paper. Collection of Discount Tire

Yvonne Brudo, Pneus Gallus (Gallus Tires), c 1900. Color lithograph on paper. Collection of Discount Tire

Unfolding across four overarching themes, the exhibition reveals how artists played a vital role in shaping the imagery and ideals of a rapidly modernizing world. Through bold graphics, luminous color, and innovative storytelling, Art in Motion highlights the surprising relationship between rubber manufacturing and modern art. Tire companies turned to artists working in styles ranging from classical antiquity to movements such as Art Nouveau, Art Deco, and Impressionism to create compelling advertising imagery. The Golden Radius focuses on the symbolic power of the tire within a culture driven by speed, mobility, and aspiration. Advertisements framed tires as gateways to freedom and exploration, encouraging viewers to envision journeys across real and imaginative terrain.

Wheels of Change explores innovation in pneumatic design and acknowledges the material origins of rubber and its transformation into a global commodity essential to modern life. The final theme, Industry and Reform, addresses the human and environmental consequences of this growth and the transition to sustainable production methods. These themes are discussed in depth through an audio tour featured on the Museum’s digital guide.

Achille Butteri, Le Roi de la Souplesse (The King of Suppleness), c. 1910. Color lithograph on paper. Collection of Discount Tire

Visitors can further explore the visual culture of the automobile through representations of Bibendum, the Michelin tire mascot first introduced at the 1894 world’s fair in Lyon, France, and period automotive fashions from the  Phoenix Art Museum Collection.

About The Discount Tire Poster Collection:  

The Collection was started in 1982 by Bruce T. Halle (1930–2018), founder and chairman of Discount Tire, headquartered in Scottsdale, AZ. It encompasses vintage advertising posters from the late 1880s to the mid-1980s. Today the collection includes over 500 color lithographs that capture the era’s creativity and humor while nodding to the technological advances made in tire manufacturing.