Catalogue Number
NMLH.2023.112
Object Name
Poster
Title
All you can write is what you see
People
Woody Guthrie
Events
Cotton Mill strike, Gastonia, 1930
Date
1972-1982
Description
The Poster Collective was a collective formed in 1971 at the Slade School of Art,  a group formed to initially produce posters in response to the miners strike and on the wars in both Vietnam and Ireland. It was formed on the basis of developing a coherent visual style, which addressed the political issues of the time. This included the armed struggles against colonialism in Africa, the struggle of women for equal rights and the continuing struggle against racism. The collective was active in the 70's and 80's, producing posters on a wide range of issues, including for educational purposes. The group was not-for-profit and used a variety of hand-printing techniques to create their posters. This is a white, green and black poster. It is landscape, and has a photograph a man, with a green photographic background of people protesting. The caption on the green and white photo says "Cotton-Mill strikes, Gastonia, N.C. 1930." The man is Woody Guthrie, an American folk singer who sang out
anti-fascism and socialism. He was closely linked to the American communist party. The text on the poster reads, "All youcan write is what you see. February 23, 1940. We sing about the hard times we're having; we sing about the hard times everybody like us is having. We just take a step further and point the finger at the boss, who's to blame. We take another stepand blame his class, and his system. We make up songs about our heroes and our leaders and our martyrs. And we also make up songs about the bosses, the murderers, and the ones who don't care if we starve to death. We're singing of the fight we're making, and the strikes, the accidents, the trials, that stand up like big sign posts pointing the way. We sing of how we're sticking together, and of the people that's helping us, and we're singing of the time when our fight's gonna be won. - Woody Guthrie."
