Damaged original Beatles 1963 poster ..what would you do?

[Fattyramone]

Being a huge Beatles ephmera collector i was delighted to have the chance to buy this fairly recently.

Its an original poster on thin card that I bought from a guy whos father used to print the posters duing this era and the 1970s , im 100% convinced of its originality. I paid £230 for it due to it being quite heavily cropped at the top and bottom , were it not cropped its price would have beyond my pocket , so the price I paid was the trade off for the inherant damage.

The poster was cropped originally to be put into the factory portfolio as examples of what the factory was capable of doing for future customers , it also has two hole punches in it ...and of course The Beatles at this time were just releasing their 1st UK single and Album and no-one could imagined the future impact they were going to have on the world so what did it matter if the artwork was damaged , beat groups were two a penny right?

Now here is what i need advice about ....

Ive been in contact with a poster restore company "POSTERFIX" in the USA (Im UK) and have been quoted the price that it would cost in the region of $800-$1200 to have it restored to its full image.

The inkwork itself looks to be fairly straight forward if done with care and knowledge , but there are two small photographic images of the two missing Beatles (Paul and George) that would need extra attention to not look awful....

So my two main questions are:

A) do you think im wasting my time and would it actually distract from what is undoubtably an exceedinly rare poster , whatever the condition?

B) Is the poster restore company I am thinking of using any good? ...(click the youtube video below to see them do the same to an original , but badly damaged Andy Warhol poster).

See also below an example of what the poster looks like in its complete state.

Any thoughts and insights would be much appreciated.

[Fattyramone]

[Fattyramone]

This is an example of it it its complete state ...the venue printing is interchangable ...this one is from the Birmingham Hippodrome.

[Fattyramone]

A more detailed photo of its damaged area ...

The staple holes are actually not as noticeable in real life as they appear here..

[Fattyramone]

This is the company im thinking of using ....Posterfix...

This is the video of them putting the big missing piece back onto the Walhol poster

http://vimeo.com/15467212

Its 9 minutes long , but facinating stuff.

[rmoore]

Wow, posterfix does some amazing work! Very interesting video.

So the recreation of flat color seems pretty straightforward, but how will they handle the 2 missing halftoned heads of Paul and George? Sounds challenging and expensive...

[wonkabars7]

This is the company im thinking of using ....Posterfix...

This is the video of them putting the big missing piece back onto the Walhol poster

http://vimeo.com/15467212

Its 9 minutes long , but facinating stuff.

AVOID Posterfix like the plague. Chris is an absolute schister.

[mfs67]

I definitely wouldn't invest that much money into restoring a poster in which the venue info and a significant portion of the image is missing. What would the top of the poster look like after the restoration? If it was used as a sample, I assume that the venue info was never added. Would it be restored to its original state as a concert poster blank? Concert poster blanks are much less desirable than those with added venue info, and even less so with that much restoration.

[KSUvet]

I wouldn't use PosterFix, base on what I've read. http://www.allposterforum.com/index.php/topic,1624.0.html
Poster Mountain is gaining a lot of fans around here lately. I don't have personal experience with either, so take it for what it's worth. I'd also personally question the value of restoring that, when the "most valuable" part is the part that's missing. If the Beatles section was intact, but the damage was to one of those other people I've never heard of, it would probably be different. Your market if you had to resell it would be Chris Montez fans (?) because a hard-core Beatles fan is probably looking for unrestored. Again, take it for what it's worth.

[Codeblue]

That's barely a Beatles poster.

[Fattyramone]

Thanks for the input guys....

Im kinda torn into wanting to restore it back to its glory or adhereing to the "I borrowed my grandfathers axe" idiom (I borrowed my grandfathers axe and i break the handle , so i replace the handle and continue to use it until i broke the head and I replaced the head and it gave me years of good service , but is it still my grandfathers axe?)

I take no positive vibes from what youve all said , so it doesnt make it easier to commit to it.

I just wish i could see first hand just how noticeable (or not) a poster can look after having had major pieces re-added to it , I think that would be the clincher either way...

In reguards the "barely a Beatles poster" comment , leaving aside the obviously major missing pieces , in so far as it being a Beatles poster it most certainly IS , albeit with them on the bottom of the bill , this was them being advertised when nobody really cared who they were in the UK let alone the USA (who wouldnt get to hear about them for another year) and ergo there was little incentive for anybody to want to keep this type of ephemera for any reason and therefore is a very important piece in their history.