Save our Placards!

 Back in March this year, I took part in the March for the Alternative along with about 500,000 other people. The march was a protest against the government’s spending cuts, and one of the largest demonstrations ever seen in the UK.

Being on the march was a fascinating experience: it was great to be part of such a friendly and positive crowd, meeting and talking to people about why they were there, and admiring the wealth of amazing banners and placards that people had made for the event. Never ones to resist the opportunity for a bit of drawing, cutting out and sticking, we of course made our own placards for the march too, and afterwards donated them to the Museum of London, who together with the Save our Placards team from Goldsmith’s were helping to document the occasion.

We were very excited to find out recently that one of our placards (the snappily titled March for the Squeezed Bottom, above) had been selected to take part in an exhibition, Nothing in the World But Youth, opening at the Turner Contemporary in Margate in September.You can read about the story behind our placard (and see some photos of me drawing the lettering) over at the Save our Placards blog; but more importantly, the team are still trying to trace the creators of 8 of the 12 placards selected for the exhibition. If you were on the march in March, then do take a look at the slideshow of placards, and get in touch with them if you know who made any of these beauties.

(It goes without saying that I'll of course be going to Margate to see our placard sharing exhibition space with work by Peter Blake, Sarah Lucas, Andy Warhol and many others, so watch this space come September for more...)