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Society of Illustrators Advertising and Institutional Annual Exhibition

MARCH 24, 2008
Here are a couple of images that were selected for the SI Advertising and Institutional exhibition. The poster above is part of a continuing series of posters I’ve been doing for the Starfish Project. 
Sometimes, we try to figure out what the difference is between “fine art” and “illustration”.  I go back and forth between doing both, and have been able to figure out some distinct differences.  This project is a good example of why I like illustration.  The Starfish Project is an organization that collects unused “leftover” HIV medicine from patients in the United States, repackages them, and redistributes them to villages in Nigeria.  This is their current website.  They wanted to create posters to put up in clinics and hospitals throughout the U.S. asking doctors and patients to save these medicines.  The images would also be used as mailers, advertisements in magazines, collateral and on the web, along with photographs and information about the clinics in Nigeria.  The Starfish Project approached a design firm for help in promoting their cause, and the design firm contacted me.  We’ve all donated our time and work to the project.  I didn’t want to sign the posters, I thought it might be a visual distraction, but they made a point of asking me to sign them because they wanted to show that the images were done specifically for the Starfish Project and not something picked up from a stock site.  It’s not often one hears that.
One of the reasons I got into art, illustration, and design was for projects like this, hoping to use whatever talent I was given to try and help people in some way.  I really enjoy doing my personal work, paintings, sculpture, etc., but these kinds of projects remind me that there are much bigger aspects to life than whatever abstract aesthetic interest I want to express at a particular time.  Helping people communicate has an important value as well.  The fact that the poster was recognized by the Society of Illustrators has made the folks running the project very happy.  The SI recognition will help shed a little more spotlight on the great work that they do.

The other poster that got into the Society of Illustrators Advertising show is the Cyrano de Bergerac Broadway poster I did this past Fall, pictured below.  The S.I. show opening is this Friday, 128 East 63 Street, 6-9 pm.  Show runs from March 29th to April 26.
© 2024 Edel Rodriguez