Dolly Rudeman

Portrait of Dolly Rudeman circa 1920s
Dolly Rudeman; photograph from the 1920s.

Dolly Rudeman (born Gustave Adolphine Wilhelmina Rüdemann, 3 February 1902 – 26 January 1980) was a Dutch graphic designer who produced posters for some of the most famous directors and film stars of her day, including Sergei Eisenstein, Charlie Chaplin, and Greta Garbo.

Born in the Dutch East Indies (now Indonesia) to Dutch parents, her father died before she was born and her mother took the family back to the Netherlands when Rudeman was in her teens. Rudeman studied art and drawing from an early age, and in the early 1930s embarked on a career in design. Concerned that there was little financial stability in art, she turned towards the medium of poster design. In the twenties, she was the only woman designing posters for the film industry, and was a prolific designer of posters and printed programs for the Netherlands Cinema Trust.

Although work dried up during the Second World War—during which she aided Jews hiding from the occupying Nazis—she returned to poster design after the war. The 1950s have been termed her 'golden age', and during this decade she expanded into other forms of design such as for postcards, chocolate boxes, and ceramics. She never achieved the fame that she had before the war, however, and died in relative obscurity in Amsterdam in 1980.