Movies

Celebrate The 2020 Oscar Nominees With These Pop Art Posters

2020 Oscar nominees artwork
By Ben Pearson

We'll all be pulling for our favorite movies to win big at the Academy Awards this weekend, but first, Shutterstock is putting the 2020 Oscar nominees for Best Picture in a whole new light in a series of pop art posters. Check them out below, along with a new Oscar illustration from artist Olly Gibbs.

According to a press release, "each of the posters features photos, vectors, textures and illustrations from Shutterstock's diverse collection of over 300 million images while drawing inspiration from world-famous pop artists," including recognizable names like Saul Bass, David Hockney, Thierry Guetta (aka Mr. Brainwash), and more. Check out the artwork below, along with a breakdown of the artists for each poster and who inspired them:

1917 by JC Moreno, inspired by David Carson.Ford v Ferrari by Alice Lee, inspired by Takashi Murakami.Jojo Rabbit by Thanh Nguyen, inspired by Yayoi Kusama.Joker by Jackelyne Castillo, inspired by Daniel Norris.Little Women by Alex Clem, inspired by Pauline Boty.Marriage Story by Flo Lau, inspired by Robert Indiana.Once Upon a Time...in Hollywood by Ian Calleja, inspired by David Hockney.Parasite by Nicole Dai, inspired by Saul Bass.The Irishman by Alex Bodin, inspired by Thierry Guetta.

I can appreciate that the artists who created these pieces were all working for Shutterstock, and therefore limited to using assets from Shutterstock libraries, but several of these are baffling to me. Some of the posters capture the essence of the movie pretty well – the Saul Bass-inspired Parasite one works wonderfully, for example, because that movie is essentially a modern Alfred Hitchcock drama, and Bass's most famous works were for many of Hitchcock's opening credit scenes. I dig the slick minimalism of the Once Upon a Time... piece, and the paint splatters mixed with blood for The Irishman is a particularly inspired choice. But that Ford v Ferrari poster could not be a worse match for that movie's tone, and without calling any others out specifically, I found many of the rest to be huge misses. (But that's just, like, my opinion, man.)

I also really like Olly Gibbs' newly-released illustration, and I encourage you to click on this tweet to explore a thread which zooms in on each individual trophy to showcase smaller details that you will almost certainly otherwise miss.

This year's Academy Awards will air on ABC at 8pm ET/5pm PT on February 9, 2020.

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