Style combination · Contrasts

Cuban Revolutionary Poster × Gráfica del 68

OSPAAAL and ICAIC posters were planned, many-coloured and made to last, while the 68 brigades printed one ink for the next march; choose Cuba for a solidarity campaign, 68 for an emergency.

From the research on Gráfica del 68 (Mexican Student Movement Graphics)

Mix them and make something Cuban Revolutionary Poster Gráfica del 68

Four boldly outlined hands and forearms in yellow, black, red and magenta grip one another’s wrists in an interlocking chain beneath the large black word “SOLIDARIDAD.” Angular coloured fields fill the background, with distressed ink textures across the cream paper. — AI-generated by Stylogeny from the recipe below, and checked against it: the type from Gráfica del 68, the form from Gráfica del 68, the composition from Cuban Revolutionary Poster. Not a real or historical work.

What each style brings

Each part of the design comes from the style with the stronger say in it, and each style gives at least two.

Cuban Revolutionary Poster (OSPAAAL & ICAIC) Gráfica del 68 (Mexican Student Movement Graphics)

Type from Gráfica del 68: Hand-lettering
All caps
Colour from Cuban Revolutionary Poster: Flat fields
Full polychrome

Gráfica del 68 avoids full polychrome: this is where the two pull against each other, which is the point of the contrast.
Form from Gráfica del 68: Stylised figuration
Pictogram
Composition from Cuban Revolutionary Poster: Single focal point
Isolated object
Surface from Gráfica del 68: Carved line
Paper & letterpress bite

The type

Open fonts standing in for each style’s own type, which is often hand-drawn or commercial.

Display · Gráfica del 68

Rise

Permanent Marker; Gráfica del 68 used Capitals cut into the linoleum block together with the image and Brushed and stencilled slogans on cardboard placards and cloth mantas

Text · Cuban Revolutionary Poster

The poster culture of revolutionary Cuba, produced for the film institute ICAIC and the solidarity organisation OSPAAAL. With no commercial advertising and scarce materials, designers made bold silkscreen and offset posters that combined Pop and psychedelic colour, op-art pattern, flat silhouettes and single conceptual images, for cinema and for internationalist causes from Vietnam to Africa.

Archivo; Cuban Revolutionary Poster used Hand-cut silkscreen display lettering and Neo-grotesque sans captions repeated in Spanish, English, French and Arabic

The colours

The ground and leading colours come from Cuban Revolutionary Poster, with a counter-accent from Gráfica del 68. The ink reads on the ground at 4.5:1 or more.

Cuban Revolutionary Poster (OSPAAAL & ICAIC) Gráfica del 68 (Mexican Student Movement Graphics)

#f2ede0 ground · 36%
#1c1c1c ink · 14%
#f5b81c accent · 18%
#c4161c accent · 14%
#a9845b accent · 10%
#d6337a accent · 8%

As CSS

:root {
  --ground: #f2ede0;
  --ink: #1c1c1c;
  --accent-1: #f5b81c;
  --accent-2: #c4161c;
  --accent-3: #a9845b;
  --accent-4: #d6337a;
  --font-display: "Permanent Marker", cursive;
  --font-text: "Archivo", sans-serif;
}

Use it with care

Gráfica del 68 (Mexican Student Movement Graphics): These images answered real repression: soldiers entered the schools, a raid on San Carlos destroyed its workshop and prints, and the number of people killed at Tlatelolco on 2 October 1968 is still not known, so do not use the bloodied dove, the gorilla or Tlatelolco imagery as edgy styling for a brand, a product or an Olympic-themed event. Mexiac's chained, gagged figure is a Tzotzil man, drawn in 1954 against the coup in Guatemala; do not turn it into a generic mascot of silencing. The makers agreed not to sign their work, for the movement's sake and for their own safety, and many attributions are later and disputed (the dove placard among them), so credit works as 'attributed to' or to the brigade, and never present a pastiche as a 1968 original.