Erin Wright

While an undergraduate at Colorado State University in the late 1970’s I had the opportunity to attend the very first Colorado International Invitational Poster Exhibition (CIIPE) organized by CSU faculty members Phil Risbeck, John Sorbie, and Bob Coonts. Now in its 22nd iteration, the CIIPE biennial is one of the oldest and has become one of the most prestigious poster exhibitions in the world. That first exhibition occurred before the fall of the Iron Curtain and showed many posters from Eastern Bloc countries, especially Poland.

That exhibition literally changed my life. As a student, I had aptitude and ability to create graphics but no desire or interest in areas such as advertising, the route may graphic designers take in their careers. These posters were a different animal altogether. Especially the ones from Poland. While ostensibly advertising theatrical plays or other cultural events, they provided powerful visual commentary on the state of living under communist rule. I do not speak a word of Polish yet that content was clearly communicated under the guise of promoting an event. For the first time I realized the power of visual communication. From that point on I determined to be a poster designer.

I create posters mostly on social and political themes. While I feel it is important to have a strong position when creating a poster, I also feel in order to draw the viewer into considering that position, it is not usually effective to bludgeon them with your viewpoint. To that end, I strive to create posters that use visual metaphor, humor, icons, symbols, etc. to cleverly engage the viewer and get my point across.

My poster rEVOLUTION was originally created for an invitational exhibition in Gwangju Metropolitan City, South Korea. The exhibition organizers asked artists to create posters on the idea of revolution in the sense of how people will interact coming out of almost two years of COVID isolation. It occurred to me that the word “evolution” is contained in “revolution” and given the recent re-focus on civil rights in our national discourse chose to interpret the theme in that context. In order for our national community to evolve, we must be made to see and allowed to speak.

Erin Wright, Professor of Graphic Design, University of Alabama at Birmingham

Erin has participated in over 100 international exhibitions including the “International Poster Biennale in Warsaw”; the “Lahti International Poster Triennial”; the“Bienal Internacional del Cartel en México”; the “Golden Bee”, in Moscow; the “Colorado International Invitational Poster Exhibition”; the “Bienal del Cartel Bolivia”; and the “International Triennial of the Political Poster” in Belgium.

He was selected as one of eight finalists in the Peru Poster Bienal from over 10,000 entries and won the Best Concept Award at the co2 International Poster Invitational as well as Biennial Honorable Mentions in the second and the third “International Socio-Political Poster Biennale” inPoland. He won a Silver Award in “Social/Political Posters” produced by Graphis. He has also been awarded both Designer of the Year and Illustrator of the Year by Birmingham Advertising Federation ADDY Awards.

He was President of the international jury for the “15th Bienal Internacional del Cartel en México” and has served as a jury member for other international exhibitions in China, Korea, Iran and Venezuela.

His work has been included in several international publications such as, “PRINT Regional Annual”; “Graphis”; and the book “Brand Designs” by Albert Choi as well as “Making Posters: From Concept to Design” by Scott Laserow and Natalia Delgado.

He is co-founder with Eric Boelts and Antonio Castro of “Posters Without Borders” biennial international invitational poster exhibition.

Space One Eleven Involvement: Posters without Borders 2013; Multiple Methods: A Print Exhibition 2014