Type, Image, Composition 4: Graphic Resistance

The background information/inspiration for this workshop comes from Paris in May 1968, there was a period of civil unrest, many protests and riots took place. At the heart of the protests was students and factory workers; the situation became so unsettled that the politicians worried a civil war or revolution was on the horizon. Out of this an artistic movement began, with protestors using song lyrics and graffiti style imagery on posters and banners.

The aim of the workshop was to create multiple stencil print posters inspired by the May ’68 revolutions. Each poster is to be made up with two stencils, one with an image and one with a slogan; both of which were selected at random from a box. My first set included a grenade as my imagery and the words “soak me in my skin” to create stencils out of. After making the first stencil (grenade) I used that to print on another piece of paper with acrylic paint and a roller. With a limited choice of colours, only red, yellow and blue available. Whilst this dried, I cut the stencil for the slogan, this was then printed using the same method over the top of the printed image of the grenade. The use of stencil allows for a crude look to be achieved if the ink bleeds slightly through the stencil and if things aren’t lined up to the centre. This process was repeated for a second poster, with a second image and slogan to focus on. For the second poster I selected a factory as my imagery and the slogan “submission ends it all”.

After creating the first two posters with the four stencils I then cre4ated a further two posters by reusing the stencils but swapping which image went with which slogan and by changing up the colours. Below are the four posters I created in the workshop and the four stencils I made to do so.