Aan

Old Bollywood poster of the hit Hindi film Aan (1952) for sale.

This is an actual surviving old Hindi movie poster of India’s first technicolour film, Aan (1952) which starred Dilip Kumar & Nadira in lead roles.

Printed and circulated a few years after the original first release of the film (somewhere in the late 1950s), this vintage Bollywood poster was printed for publicity of the film but never ended up being used.

This vintage Bollywood poster was originally designed in hand painted oil on canvas format by a small time art studio in Delhi, making it highly collectible. The poster features a quirky portrait of Dilip Kumar standing in a heroic avatar. The background has been painted using a combination of red and yellow, giving it a stunning appearance. Title of the film is seen in red, prominently set against a yellow background.

A large hand drawn Mehboob Productions logo, comprising a communist hammer and sickle, is seen in white and yellow on the top left.

Aan was produced and directed by Mehboob Khan at an extremely large budget for its time. Besides receiving the distinction of being India’s first Technicolour film (shot in 16mm Gevacolour and later blown up in Technicolor), Aan was one of the first Indian movies to have a worldwide release. In the US, Aan was released under the name “The Savage Princess.” The film was later dubbed in French and released in 1954 in France as “Mangala, fille des Indes” (Mangala, girl of India). The film starred Dilip Kumar, Premnath, Nimmi and marked the debut of Jewish actress Florence Ezekiel Nadira (simply known as “Nadira”).