Julia Carrillo

Corita Kent is a well-known activist artist who utilizes typography and manipulates the typeface in a way that conveys a feeling and a message, such as in her screen print stop the bombing, 1967. This work demonstrates the timelessness of the topic of activist art and the early use of fusion with graphic design. Kent manipulated the text to share a message and act as a picture to show urgency through visual hierarchy and loud text ‘STOP THE BOMBING’ which was made alarming by the bold red colors and linear movement. The larger text sits on top of a smaller, hard to read script type that conveys the message of the ignored and unheard victims of the bombing in Vietnam. Today, we are in an era where social media plays an important role when it comes to giving a platform for politics, activism, and spreading information to a massive audience in a short amount of time. Words hold a significant amount of power and dictate how an audience will react when reading headlines or even reading tweets from a politician. The power of speech can be dangerous but can be useful too, as exemplified by Kent’s print. Through graphic design on social media as today’s political forum, activist art has the power to gain mass attention and relay important information at the same time. Many social movements such as “Stop Asian Hate” and “I Can’t Breathe” gained massive traction thanks to social media. But graphic design is often seen as a negative tool used to promote capitalism and consumerism. My argument is that the medium is no different from all other art forms, it can also be used for activism and social issues. Many visual artists have used graphic design in their work; however, the audience does not realize it. The fusion of imagery and the power of typography and words can create a revolutionary work, such as the phrase and slogan ‘Black Lives Matter’ in association with the fist symbol. As my study will show, there are many activist artworks that utilize graphic design to provide useful information about a movement.