Walking in the front door of 1014 E. 11th Ave. is the equivalent of being transported back in time to the 1920s, but instead of being transported by science, those who walk in are taken back in time through art. There are a plethora of prints hanging in frames and set up on shelves, offering adventure, horror, sci-fi and romance, some in black and white and some in color.  

Artistic Soul Studio is home to over 500 movie posters and prints on display in the shop’s apartment duplex and has hundreds of more posters in storage.

Leon Vincent, a self-proclaimed architect of photography, is the owner and collector of this vast artistic cinematic collection that opened in November of 2011. 

“This is such a unique and select shop. There is no other poster shop like this in the state of Kentucky or Tennessee, that I know of, that offers nothing but movie posters,” Vincent said. 

Vincent got his start in the movie poster business back in 1990 when he went to his first film festival in Knoxville, Tennessee. 

“I met a boy there with a table of window card movie posters and I was taken aback by the artwork of it,” Vincent said. 

From that point on, Vincent started attending more film festivals and began attending them annually. He purchased many of the movie posters in his collection from film festivals he attended, but he said that 75 percent of his collection he got through the mail.

Artistic Soul, however, did not start off with the intention of selling movie posters. In 2006, Vincent had his first exhibit of his digital artwork and adopted the name of Artistic Soul Studio. 

“If I’d known I’d be doing this now, then I would have included movie poster somewhere in the title back then,” Vincent said.

Vincent intends to sell a good amount of his own original artwork as well as his collection of movie posters. He has recently stopped amassing his collection of posters and is now focusing on selling his collection. 

“My website right now has 1,148 prints for sale. What I have in this store is just a drop in the bucket,” Vincent said.

He has travelled to warehouses in the United States and Canada in search of rare finds, and he goes in search of movie stars for their coveted autographs.  

What may be unknown to many people is that there are different types of movie posters. 

“People come in here all the time and don’t know the differences,” Vincent said.

He said there are five different types of movie posters: window card, insert card, lobby card, one sheet and half sheet. The main differences in the movie posters deals with the sizes.

The most common type of poster one can find at Artistic Soul is the one sheet poster. The one sheet is also considered the most collectible print and is used in the official advertising for films.

Vincent said that buying a poster is buying a piece of movie history at a reasonable price.

“The prices for these posters, all originals, range from as low as $3 to up to $700,” Vincent said.

Vincent said most people don’t buy the posters because they have seen the movie. He recalled one case when a woman in Arizona bought a Western-genre movie print from him online because the movie was based on the street that woman lived on. 

One of the original posters Vincent has for sale is the one-sheet poster for the movie “Halloween” that was directed and written by John Carpenter, Bowling Green native and graduate of WKU.

Vincent said that Carpenter is known to have included references to Bowling Green and WKU in his films.

Vincent’s favorite print is the German poster of the movie “Dances With Wolves.” 

“This is the only movie poster I have framed for me, and it’s not for sale,” Vincent said.

He recognizes the rich history and education movie posters hold and wish more people from WKU would visit if solely for educational purposes.  

His wife, Pat Vincent, echoed his sentiments.

“Even those in the art department can learn from these illustrations,” Pat Vincent said.

Artistic Soul Studio is open from 1 p.m. to 5 p.m on Thursdays and Fridays and noon to 4 p.m. on Saturdays. Times, however, can often be sporadic, and the best way to see if the shop is open is to call 270-991-0614. Check out their website at artisticsoulstudio.com and their Etsy page, etsy.com/shop/ArtisticSoulStudio.