Social Justice Posters - Ramon Montes

The social justice issue I wanted to focus on was targeted towards equality and race. I wanted to address how Puerto Ricans have been treated as second-class citizens when in reality all Puerto Ricans are born U.S. citizens. It does not matter if the person lives in the states or on the island. Unfortunately, Puerto Rico has had to endure through multiple natural disasters causing lots of damage throughout the island. Some of you may recall the hurricanes Maria and Irma from a couple of years ago, but there has also been a couple earthquakes in recent years. The U.S.'s response to aiding Puerto Rico was rather slow and is why this saying, "Can't Say American Without The Rican" originated to be a reminder that Puerto Ricans are U.S. citizens too. 

Anyways, the first poster I created was really simple and was the 12" x 18" portrait poster. I wanted a plain white background as I want my viewer's attention focused on the message being displayed. I chose the blue and red colors to have a patriotic tone. Both the Puerto Rican and American flags have blue, red, and white in their flags so I wanted to use these colors throughout my posters in some way. I used proximity as a principle with some of the words to focus the viewers attention on the beginning of the message and used the red as a frame of the beginning message. I left some extra space for the "Rican" word and made this slightly bigger in size than the rest of the other words because I want viewers to reach the end of the message that is slightly . I wanted blue and red to be in "Rican" for that greater sense of patriotism. The reason I chose Sigmar One font is because I did not think it was too harsh of a font, but it was still bold, especially with capital letters. This message was meant to be made as a friendly reminder, which this font captures well. 

Social Justice Poster #1 | 12" x 18" | White background with red and blue colored, capitalized letters | Sigmar One font | Portrait

The second poster I created was the 11" x 8" landscape poster. I initially used Sigmar One font, but decided to change the font to a more slick, and casual font being Merienda One. The reason for this is because I plan on hanging this at my job and think this font is better suited there. I get along really well with everyone there including the clients I serve. I chose a black background this time since I wanted to make use of white in the saying. I used all of the colors throughout the phrase to have a sense of balance, but if you notice I kept repeating the colors in the same order: red, white, and blue. I also focused on alignment and kept font size the same to make this message cohesive, but also visually appealing. 

Social Justice Poster #2 | 11" x 8" | Black background with red, white, and blue colored, capitalized letters | Merienda One font | Landscape

As for my final poster, I used the size and placement of colors to resemble the Puerto Rican flag in a subtle manner. This one is 11" x 5.75" and has a gray background. As you can tell, I used the same font as the one in my first poster. I really like the way this font captures the message as once again, it feels like a bold, yet friendly reminder. I wanted to capture this message in a different format, which is why I decided to make the words vertical. The image is symmetrically balanced and  the letters are aligned to mimic the flag, which is a significant feature as Puerto Ricans are full of pride and have flags everywhere. In a way, I designed this message as a miniature Puerto Rican flag. I do have the symbol of the flag on some of my clothes, and ornaments, but I do not own an actual flag, so I am going to keep this one posted to my wall. 

Social Justice Poster #3 | 11" x 5.75" | Gray background with blue, red, and white colored, capitalized letters read vertically | Sigmar One font | Landscape