CELEBRATE PEOPLE’S HISTORY: the Poster Book of Resistance and Revolution: Poster Exhibit – Book Release Party – Artist Panel
FREE admission, but donations (to go to MacPhee’s partner, Dara Greenwald, who is battling cancer) gratefully accepted.
Featured Speakers: Sabiha Basrai, graphic designer, Design Action Collective, www.designaction.org Lincoln Cushing, poster historian, www.docspopuli.org
There’s a good chance that during some point in your life you’ve seen a Celebrate People’s History poster, decorating the walls of your classroom, community center or neighborhood book shop. Initiated by Josh MacPhee in 1998, this far-reaching project uses poster art to expose the hidden history of feminist organizing, indigenous uprisings, civil rights leaders, union struggles, LGBT activism and much more.
For the first time ever, a complete set of these posters has been released in hardback by the Feminist Press. Edited by Josh MacPhee with a foreword by Rebecca Solnit, Celebrate People’s History: the Poster Book of Resistance and Revolution reprints over 100 posters along with many new designs commissioned for this affordable, 256-page volume.
Bay Area history stands out prominently in the book with tributes to the 1969 occupation of Alcatraz, the 1966 transgender riot at Compton’s Cafeteria and the 10-year anti-eviction battle by Filipino seniors at the International Hotel. The posters also honor San Francisco’s youth-led demonstrations of 2008 against immigration raids and the successful defense of Los Siete de la Raza, a group of Mission activists who were framed for the murder of a policeman in 1969.
The book includes talented Bay Area printmakers Jesus Barraza, Melanie Cervantes, Eric Drooker, Art Hazelwood, Fernando Marti, Jos Sances and Miriam Klein Stahl along with many well-known national artists such as Sabrina Jones, Cristy Road, Nicole Schulman, Chris Stain, Swoon and Laura Whitehorn.
Come to the book’s West Coast premiere for a poster exhibit, book signing by Bay Area contributors and artist panel.
Josh MacPhee is the co-editor of Signs of Change: Social Movement Cultures – 1960s to Now (2010), Realizing the Impossible: Art Against Authority (2007) and Reproduce and Revolt (2008). He is also the author of Stencil Pirates: a Global Study of the Street Stencil (2004) and the founder of the Justseeds Artists’ Cooperative.
Guest speaker Sabiha Basrai is a graphic designer with the Design Action Collective, a former-staff member of Philadelphia’s Public Interest GRFX and co-coordinator of the Alliance of South Asians Taking Action (ASATA).
Guest speaker Lincoln Cushing is the author of Revolucion: Cuban Poster Art (2003), co-author of Chinese Posters (2007), co-author of Agitate! Educate! Organize! – American Labor Posters (2009) and editor of Visions of Peace & Justice (2007).