Save the Press Campaign. Save the Press. 1989
Save the Press Campaign (South Africa, active 1988-1990). Save the Press. 1989. Offset-printed sticker. Composition: 5 7/8 x 2 1/4" (15 x 5.7 cm); sheet: 5 7/8 x 2 1/4" (15 x 5.7 cm). Designer: Brett Murray. Publisher: Save the Press Campaign, Cape Town. Printer: Esquire Press, Cape Town. Edition: probably several thousand. The Ralph E. Shikes Fund, 2007 © 2011 Brett Murray
Brett Murray derived this image from a photograph in David Goldblatt’s historic photobook On the Mines (1973), which explores the harsh realities of mining in South Africa. The muzzled face appeared on posters and stickers for Save the Press, a short-lived grassroots campaign formed in Cape Town by journalists in reaction to draconian restrictions imposed by the apartheid government on the freedom of the press. The degraded image, made via repeated photocopying and collage, recalls an infamous 1977 Sex Pistols poster (God Save the Queen, by Jamie Reid), in which Queen Elizabeth II’s eyes and mouth are collaged over; Murray was briefly involved with a postpunk band in the early 1980s, and had created many posters in this spirit.
