The South, 1967, Push Pin Graphic no. 54

Discipline: Editorial design
Format: Magazine
Designer: Seymour Chwast
Illustrator: Seymour Chwast

Chwast supported the civil rights movement and its young martyrs. For this issue he published songs and images of the Old South juxtaposed as a counterpoint to photographs of activists (plus Emmitt Louis Till, an innocent teenager) killed by white racists. The entire issue was a bold commentary on the doctrine of “separate but equal” that prefigured the landmark civil rights legislation enacted during Lyndon B. Johnson’s administration. Push Pin’s members supported (and worked for) civil rights, yet this unique and poignant Graphic was one of the rare political statements made by a graphic design studio at that time.