06 July 2009
Recently Shepard Fairey released his “FREEDOM TO LEAD” poster of Aung San Suu Kyi. His work is, as always, extraordinary and charged with tones of revolution and it’s great to see him helping out another great political cause—one that needs all the publicity it can garner.
A couple years ago, the US Campaign for Burma asked me to create a logo for them to commemorate her birthday and to try to raise awareness of Suu Kyi’s situation. I don’t know to what extent it was used (beyond a shirt and some patches that are pictured below)—although I did see a picture of a wall in Thailand tiled with wheat-pasted posters of it not long after I finished it.
The brief was two-colors max and simplified and iconic enough to be reproduced at small sizes. We tried to capture both her determined strength and her soft, motherly side. There was no budget, so the type had to be created by hand, as well. Anyways, not to compare mine vs. his, but… here’s mine, and (obviously) above is his.
