Josh MacPhee

Josh MacPhee is an artist, curator and activist living in Brooklyn, New York. MacPhee graduated from Oberlin College in 1996 and spent eight years as an artist and activist in Chicago, Illinois where he established a distribution system called justseeds in order get more radical art projects out to the public. At its inception Justseeds primarily offered art by Josh MacPhee; now the Justseeds Artists' Cooperative is a cooperative of 25 like-minded artists.

Josh MacPhee is the author of Stencil Pirates: A Global Study of the Street Stencil, published by Soft Skull Press, which is dedicated to stencil street art; He co-edited Realizing the Impossible: Art Against Authority with Erik Rueland published by AK Press, and Reproduce and Revolt, with Favianna Rodriquez and the upcoming Paper Politics: Socially Engaged Printmaking Today on PM Press. MacPhee is also the curator of the politically charged printmaking exhibition, Paper Politics, which has been touring North America since 2004 and includes an international group of artists such as: Sue Coe, Swoon, Sixten, Tyler Kline, Meredith Stern and Meek. In 2001 he co-organized the Department of Space and Land Reclamation in Chicago with Emily Forman and Nato Thompson. MacPhee also participated in Rising Up, an exhibition with Vanessa Renwick at Tollbooth Gallery and Toby Room in 2004 with the project Celebrate People’s History that featured wheat paste art along with experimental video in public spaces and included work by Cristy Road, Sabrina Jones, Carrie Moyer, Laura Whitehorn, David Lester, and Eric Drooker. In 2008 he co-curated the exhibition Signs of Change: Social Movement Cultures 1960's to Now with Dara Greenwald.
He is a member of the artist collaborative Spectres of Liberty with Olivia Robinson and Dara Greenwald.
Josh MacPhee served as the juror for the Third Coast National in 2008, an exhibition of eclectic artworks by artists from across the United States at K Space Contemporary in Corpus Christi, Texas.

Postcard Set #2: Celebrate People’s History

Josh MacPhee August 1997

Drawing Resistance

Josh MacPhee

2001

An Exhibition Curated by Sue Simensky Bietila & Nicolas Lampert

Make Art Not War

Josh MacPhee September 2004

Pound the Pavement #9

Josh MacPhee

Date

November 2005

Format

Publication

16 page zine with screenprinted cover (varied colors)
full color insides

Chemicals Make Our Lives Better

Josh MacPhee

Sticker May 2006

2007 NYC Anarchist Bookfair

Josh MacPhee & Kevin Caplicki

Date

May 2007

Format

Screen Print

5 color silkscreen poster
Signed/unnumbered (but there are only a few left!)

Pilot TV

Josh MacPhee

May 2007

Format

Screen Print

3 color screen print
Signed and unnumbered edition

Attica

Josh MacPhee

May 2007

Format

Offset Print

2 color offset poster
Unsigned and unnumbered edition

Slingshot/Weed Postcard

Josh MacPhee

May 2007

Format

Postcard

2 color letterpress postcard
Unsigned/unnumbered

Pound the Pavement #10

Josh MacPhee

June 2007

Format

Publication

Screen printed cover
Handbound with metal posts
Edition of 200

Untitled

Josh MacPhee

September 2007

Format

Screen Print

4 color silkscreen print
Signed/unnumbered edition (only 2 left, then they are gone!)

Winter In America

Josh MacPhee

September 2007

Format

Screen Print

2 color screen print
Color of paper varies with each print
Signed and unnumbered edition

Inspired by one of Gil Scott-heron’s greatest songs—and one of the most prescient and powerful articulations of contemporary life in the United States—”Winter in America.”

Hopefully the print speaks for itself, and just as hopefully the winter will thaw soon.

Cut and Paint #2

Colin Matthes, Josh MacPhee, & Nicolas Lampert

December 2007

Format

Publication

No More

Josh MacPhee

May 2008

Format

Screen Print

2 color screen print
Signed and unnumbered edition

A police badge is not a license to beat and kill. There is evidence that increases of police violence and weaponry precede increases of violent crime in communities. Based on designs made for Art Against Police Brutality exhibitions in Chicago in 1999 and 2000, printed in 2006. Unfortunately still relevant.

2008 NYC Anarchist Bookfair

Josh MacPhee & Kevin Caplicki

May 2008

Format

Screen Print

2 color screen poster
Signed and unnumbered edition

Emma Goldman hollering at the masses in Union Square. The second NY Anarchist Bookfair poster Kevin and Josh collaborated on.

Ghost of the Liberty Street Church

Dara Greenwald, Olivia Robinson, & Josh MacPhee

Spectres of Liberty

May 2008

Format

Publication & Screen Print

2 color screen print and photocopied zine
Signed and unnumbered edition

This poster and zine are documents from the Spectres of Liberty public event and action we did in Troy, NY in May 2008. You can read more about the event at Spectresofliberty.com. Like a 19th century broadside, the poster was used as an announcement for the event. The zine contains info about the event, as well as a complete reprinting of Rev. Henry Highland Garnet’s 1843 “An Address to the Slaves of the United States of America,” a call for slaves to rise up and take their own freedom. This speech was so radical at the time that it caused a split between Garnet and other abolitionists such as Frederick Douglass (both of whom were former slaves).

Reproduce & Revolt/Reproduce Y Rebélate

Favianna Rodriguez & Josh MacPhee

Published by Soft Skull Press

November 2008

Format

Book

192 pages in black & white
English and Spanish language

A collection of over 500 political graphics, Reproduce & Revolt/Reproduce Y Rebélate contains original art granted by the creators to the public domain, to be freely used on political posters, flyers, and campaigns. A bilingual (English & Spanish) book, it also includes a history of the reproducible political graphic and a design how-to for anyone interested in using the images in this book to help change the world. A powerful collection of graphic work by some of the world’s most active and interesting political propagandists, street artists and socially conscious graphic designers. Over 100 artists from over 25 countries are included!
Almost all of the Justseeds crew are inside, as well as many other artists, including: Morgon Andrews, Janet Attard, Jon-Paul Bail, Brandon Bauer, Beehive Design Collective, Christopher Bettig, Joe Biel, Erok Boerer, Scott Boylston, Dave Buchen, Rebecca Bughouse, Jacinta Bunnelll, Christopher Cardinale, John Carr, Tom Civil, Juan Compean, Carlos Cortez, Mathew Curran, Lincoln Cushing, Hugh D’Andre, Design Action Collective, Eric Drooker, Emek, John Emerson, Shepard Fairey, Peter Fine, Brandy Flower, Juan Fuentes, Clifford Harper, Theodore Harris, Art Hazelwood, John Jennings, Sandy Kaltenborn, Keinom, Klutch, Marc Lepson, David Lester, Ricardo Levins Morales, Liberation Ink, Rico Lins, Dave Loewenstin, Alejandro Magallanes, Estria Miyashiro, Doug Minkler, Richard Mock, Claude Moller, Mary Patten, Armando Pineda Cruz, Esperanza Portilla Zamora, Pure Evil, Toufic El Rassi, Ally Reeves, Vanessa Renwick, Cristy Road, Artemio Rodríguez, Melina Rodrigo, Keith Rosson, Lisa Roth, Ryan Saari, Margarita Sada, Leonel Sagahón, San Francisco Print Collective, Nicole Schulman, Susan Simensky Bietila, Tim Simons, Andy Singer, Sixten, Santiago Solis, Miriam Klein Stahl, Struggle Inc., Taller Popular de Serigrafia, Rini Templeton, Rocky Tobey, Seth Tobocman, Un Mundo Feliz, Vomito Attack, Christine Wong Yap, and many more.

How Many Dead?

Josh MacPhee

December 2008

Format

Screen Print

4 color screen print
Signed and unnumbered edition

A product of my experimentation with the merger of half-toned photos and drawn elements, from 2007. This woman stands out on the street corner in Troy, NY every weekend holding a sign with the current number of dead U.S. soldiers in Iraq. I took the liberty of changing her sign to ask what seems to me to be the question her presence raises. This print is inspired by all the people that have been consistent and persistent in their opposition to the war.

Think Galactic

Josh MacPhee

August 2009

Format

Offset Print

full color poster
Unsigned and unnumbered offset edition

This is a nice offset poster of the design I created for the 2009 Think Galacticon, an annual radical political science fiction conference held in Chicago. This one is for all the crossover sci-fi/political art fans out there!

The idea behind the design is that we always see astronauts as atomized individuals floating in space, but what if we had an outer space council? A floating popular assembly?

Grow Tall

Josh MacPhee

March 2009

Format

Offset Print

Full color offset print
Unnumbered edition of 500

I originally created this piece for Tom Civil’s great Breakdown Poster Series. I like it so much I want it to circulate more, so I decided to do this offset print run. I’m working with issues of environmental destruction, rebirth, solidarity, labor, and social organization, but I suppose you can read into it any number of ideas.

Celebrando 15 Años de Lucha Zapatista

Josh MacPhee

April 2009

Format

Screen Print

2 color screen print
80lb cover weight kraft paper
Signed and numbered edition of 93

From 2009, this print is a celebration of the 15 year anniversary of the Zapatistas public emergence from the Lacandon Jungle in Southern Mexico in 1994. For over twenty years they have been an inspiration to me and millions of others.

Wounded Knees

Josh MacPhee

June 2009

Format

Digital Print

Full color digital print
Signed and stamped on back/unnumbered edition (but only a small number were made)

I originally created this poster for the Wounded Knees show at the 2008 All Tomorrow’s Parties Festival. It’s a reworking of the record cover I did for their All Rise 10″, playing off 19th century labor themes. Wounded Knees is a great band, made up of Suzanne Thorpe and Jimmy Shields. They’ve both been in a ton of great rock and experimental bands…

Melt Ice

Josh MacPhee

August 2009

Format

Screen Print

4 color screen print
Signed and numbered edition of 79

This poster was inspired by a number of criss-crossing events and ideas. On the one hand, stylistically, I’ve been looking at old Works Progress Administration (WPA) posters, particularly their ability to communicate clear and strong ideas without the use of black or any dark trapping color to hold the design together. So many of us contemporary political poster makers revert to dumping easy solid outlines around our images in order to contain and frame them and give an additional graphic punch; I wanted to challenge myself to try to make some images without using this graphic device.
In addition, at the time this was printed (2009) Obama had been recently elected, a lot of words had flown around about a new WPA and more money being dumped into the arts. Little was aid about what the content of said new WPA art would be. This was my call to demand that if there is arts funding, it be used to support those most marginalized in our society and to help strengthen worker’s organization. I want total liberation, not piecemeal reforms and a better existence for artists while others lose jobs, food, and life.

Noam Chomsky: Crisis & Hope

Josh MacPhee & Kevin Caplicki

August 2009

Format

Screen Print

5 color silkscreen print
Signed and numbered edition of 60

An event poster for Chomsky’s big talk at the Riverside Church in New York City in June 2009. We really tried to push ourselves with this one, experimenting with new colors and styles. We decided not to represent Chomsky, which seems to be what every other poster has done, and instead to graphically represent the explosion of ideas and struggles he was addressing. We only printed 60 of these, and almost 40 were sold at the event. We have a small handful to sell here on Justseeds.

Make Art Not War Postcard

Josh MacPhee

January 2010

Format

Offset Print & Postcard

Offset printed postcard

A postcard version (in color!) of my poster design which originally was part of the Clamor Magazine “Make Art Not War” poster set from 2002.

Pound the Pavement #11

Josh MacPhee

April 2010

Format

Publication

Hand cut-out cover and hand-stamped
Edition of 75

Here’s issue #11 of Pound the Pavement. This one is from 2008 and was in the works for ten years. It’s a FULL COLOR BOOK of graffiti on box trucks. 100 photos I’ve taken of mobile graffiti from ten different cities between 1997 and 2007 (the bulk from NYC and SF). Finally done after all these years, this thing was expensive to print, but it’s great to get it out of my system and into the world. Enjoy.

Kold Krush

Josh MacPhee

August 2010

Format

Screen Print

3 color screen print
100# bright white paper
Signed and numbered edition of 20

Keep cool during the summer—and look cool during the winter—with a Kold Krush print. The perfect wall adornment for the ice cream-inclined, these were originally printed as part of the Kold Krush art installation that Chris Stain, Billy Mode, and I did at Artscape in Baltimore in 2009.
p.s. In Baltimore, sno-cones are called snow balls!

Sacco and Vanzetti

Josh MacPhee

Celebrate People's History Poster

October 2010

Format

Offset Print & People's History Poster

2 color offset printed poster
Unsigned/unlimited edition

US Military Interventions Since WWII

Josh MacPhee

Date

November 2010

Format

Offset Print

2 color offset print
Unsigned and unnumbered edition of 500

A reworking of the “Places the US Has Bombed” poster. I’ve added a number of countries and listed the source of the information (William Blum). I dare say this poster might be deemed a “classic” at this point, since I’ve done multiple stencil print runs, multiple silkscreen print runs, it’s been in multiple books & magazines, and pasted up around the US.

Paper Politics: Socially Engaged Printmaking Today

Josh MacPhee

Published by PM Press

February 2011

Format

Book

Full color offset printing
Perfect bound

Paper Politics: Socially Engaged Printmaking Today is a major collection of contemporary politically and socially engaged printmaking. This full color book showcases print art that uses themes of social justice and global equity to engage community members in political conversation. Based on an art exhibition which has traveled to a dozen cities in North America, Paper Politics features artwork by over 200 international artists; an eclectic collection of work by both activist and non-activist printmakers who have felt the need to respond to the monumental trends and events of our times.

Paper Politics presents a breathtaking tour of the many modalities of printing by hand: relief, intaglio, lithography, serigraph, collagraph, monotype, and photography. In addition to these techniques, included are more traditional media used to convey political thought, finely crafted stencils and silk-screens intended for wheat pasting in the street. With essays by Deborah Caplow, Eric Triantafillou, and Josh MacPhee, as well as short writings on printmaking by over a dozen artists in the book.
Almost all of the Justseeds crew are inside, as well as many other artists, including: Sue Coe, Tom Civil, Christopher Cardinale, Jan Danebode, Sanya Hyland, Emek, Keinom, Klutch, Morgan Andrews, Janet Attard, BORF, Jon-Paul Bail, Brandon Bauer, Rebecca Bughouse, John Carr, Mathew Curran, Art Hazelwood, MEEK, David Lester, Dave Loewenstein, Doug Minkler, Claude Moller, Nicole Schulman, Susan Simensky Bietila, Sixten, Miriam Klein Stahl, Rocky Tobey, Seth Tobocman, and many more.

Toward Freedom (Palestine)

Josh MacPhee

April 2011

Format

Screen Print

3 color screen print
Signed and numbered edition of 43

This is one of three prints inspired by the recent uprisings in N. Africa and the Middle East. Central to struggles in the region is the conception of a Palestine free from the repression and control of Israel (and maybe even an Israel free from the repression and control of Israel!). So this print series is connecting Palestine to Egypt to the USA, which of course reconnects back to Palestine and Egypt as the US is the largest funder of the repressive regimes in both places. (The Egypt and US editions are currently sold out).

In addition, as a person critical of nationalism, the flags are disassembled, each pennant only carrying one color of the national flag, and in the case of the US, a big black flag in the center, representing the need to completely break down US nationalism and replace it with an anti-authoritarian and internationalist conception of the world.

Signal:02

Alec Dunn & Josh MacPhee

A Journal of International Political Graphics & Culture

July 2012

Format

Book

160 page full color book

Signal is an ongoing book series dedicated to documenting and sharing political graphics, creative projects, and cultural production of international resistance and liberation struggles. Signal digs deep through our common history to unearth this often-overlooked but essential role art and culture have played in struggles the world over. Published by PM Press.

Signal:01 is available HERE.
Signal:03 is available HERE.
Signal:04 is available HERE.
You can also purchase all three issues as a set HERE.

For A Society Without Prisons

Josh MacPhee

Celebrate People's History Poster

July 2012

Format

Offset Print & People's History Poster

2 color offset printed poster
Unsigned/unlimited edition

In 1993, the guerilla group the Red Army Faction bombed the construction site of a new super maximum security prison in Weiterstadt, Germany. Over $90 million in damage was caused, the opening of the prison was delayed by four years, and no

one was seriously injured. This was the final action of the RAF before disbanding.
“For a society without prisons!”—Commando Katharina Hammerschmidt, Red Army Faction, March 30, 1993
Printed at the worker-owned Stumptown Printers, Portland, OR.
This is #85 in the Celebrate People’s History Poster Series.

Feet on the Ground

Josh MacPhee

December 2012

Format

Screen Print & Stencil Print

1 color screen print
80# French cover stock
Signed and numbered edition of 52

This print grew out of working with Chris Stain on his “The Truth Hurts” exhibition in Charlotte, NC this Fall. We collaborated on a zine of the same name, including a series of funny/jarring juxtapositions of photos of police brutality with slogans from inspirational posters designed to decorate corporate offices. This was one of the best.

All Borders Are Temporary

Josh MacPhee

August 2013

Format

Relief Print

4 color letterpress print
Signed edition of 5 A/P's

The idea of borders in the 21st century conjures images of giant concrete walls and razor wire, but borders exist in various forms for different people. This sad and lonely barricade reflects how states and policing systems often claim more than they can actually control. The gaps in the fence are always wider than they first appear.

The Readers

Josh MacPhee

January 2014

Format

Screen Print

4 color screen print
Acid-free paper
Signed and numbered edition of 40

I love books, and I love reading. This print started out as an extension of the sketches I have been doing of worms, and then I converted them into hands and books while working on a logo for my friends’ bookstore Human Relations in Brooklyn. I then extended the logo and made some more complicated designs, one of them being used on the cover of the eighth issue of the literary magazine SLAB. This print is a variation of that design.

Another variation of this design is included in a Justseeds Collaborative portfolio about education, Liberating Learning.

DS128.4

Josh MacPhee

Alternate 2

July 2014

Format

Screen Print

2 color screen print
Offwhite acid free stock
Signed and numbered edition of 30
Printed by Kevin Caplicki at the Bushwick Print Lab

This is an variation on a print I created for the Librarians and Archivists with Palestine Box Set produced with Booklyn.

All Together Now!

Drew Cameron/Combat Paper & Josh MacPhee

November 2015

Format

Other Format

3 colors of paper pulp printed into sheets of Combat Paper
Signed and numbered edition of 5

These are unique, one of a kind paper prints produced by Drew Cameron of Combat Paper. The image, by Josh MacPhee, is literally part of the paper, screenprinted into it while it was being hand-pulled. The image is produced by spraying dyed paper pulp through a silkscreen into the paper pulp while it is being pulled to make a sheet of paper. This means that while the image is produced in a way similar to other printing methods, each piece is also a one-of-a-kind monoprint. A second impression of the print is below, so that you can see the differences between each.
The imagery is rooted in two visual subjects MacPhee keeps returning to: elongated worm-like arms and attempts at representing a collectivity that also preserves individuality. The words “All Together Now” don’t refer to anything specifically, but given their presence on a sheet of Combat Paper, they evoke collective resistance to war. Combat Paper is produced by the pulping military uniforms in order to convert them into sheets of paper.

March

Josh MacPhee

November 2015

Format

Screen Print

1 color screen print
Stonehenge cream rag paper
Signed/unnumbered edition

A celebration of one of the most tried and true protest tactics. Yet also a bit ambiguous—where are we marching to? Can all those legs get in step?
Popular movements are always chaotic, yet our representations of them tend to smooth the edges and present some sort of unified vision. The feet on the ground tend to tell a different story.
Printed by Jesse Purcell at Repetitive Press in Toronto.
attn: The paper has a really nice tooth and texture to it, so each print is slightly different, with variations in ink coverage.

People’s Climate March!

Josh MacPhee

December 2015

Format

Digital Print

Full color digital poster
Unsigned and unnumbered

I designed this poster for the 2014 People’s Climate March in New York City. It was one of a series of posters commissioned by 350.org and the Climate March to mobilize people across N. America for the event.
While the obvious design solutions for a poster about a march related to the environment were to (a) represent people protesting, (b) show some sort of ecological disaster, and (c) lean heavily on the color green. I didn’t want to do any of those things. I was banging my head trying to come up with an idea and figured out I wanted to do something lighter than your average protest poster, something funny. And what’s funnier than feet? So I replaced the enduring icon of resistance—the fist—with the raised foot. Made the toes talk, turning them into some strange sort of collectivity, and made the feet blue—a color to cool the scorching earth as me march across it.
These posters were from the initial set printed by the organizers, before the final date of September 20th was set, thus the double date.

Fuck Work

Josh MacPhee

April 2016

Format

Screen Print

Available in five different colors
Unnumbered and unsigned edition

Lonely Books

Josh MacPhee

Pound the Pavement #14

October 2016

Format

Publication

Risograph printed, 2 color throughout
Printed in an edition of 200

For almost a decade now I’ve been walking around my neighborhood finding books people put out on the sidewalk. At first I was looking for books I wanted, but eventually started getting interested in the phenomena of the lone book, lying solo on the ground. It was hard to not personify them, to see “lonely books.” When my son was born, I found myself walking him around a couple block radius from our apartment incessantly, either to get him to sleep, or to get groceries, or to take him to the park. I started taking photos of the books, and thinking about what they would be saying or feeling if they actually did have personalities. So this zine/artist book is a collection of those photos and ruminations. It was really fun to make, I hope it’s just as fun to read!
This is Pound the Pavement #14.
Printed on the risograph at Beyond Repair by Wooden Leg Print & Press in Minneapolis in September, 2016.

Liberation Support Movement

Interference Archive & Josh MacPhee

Building Solidarity with the African Liberation Struggle

Organize Your Own: The Politics and Poetics of Self-Determination Movements

edited by Anthony Romero & Josh MacPhee

Soberscove Press

November 2016

Format

Book

Offset printed book
248 pages (64 pages in color)

Fifty years ago, Stokely Carmichael, the leader of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) made a historic call: “One of the most disturbing things about almost all white supporters of the movement has been that they are afraid to go into their own communities–which is where the racism exists–and work to get rid of it. They want to run from Berkeley to tell us what to do in Mississippi; let them look instead at Berkeley. . . . Let them go to the suburbs and open up freedom schools for whites.”
Organize Your Own: The Politics and Poetics of Self-Determination Movements features new work by contemporary artists, poets, and writers that relates to the Black Power movement’s mandate to “organize your own” community against racism. Exploring the question of what “your own” might mean, this book connects some of the concerns dealt with in the 1960s and ’70s to the conversations and social movements around racial justice happening today. Far from an historical account, Organize Your Own documents and expands upon an exhibition and event series of the same name that took place in Chicago and Philadelphia in early 2016.
In addition to exhibition documentation and a series of commissioned texts, this book also includes transcripts from five panel discussions that were organized as part of the exhibition. Two of these discussions focus on the original Rainbow Coalition, a unique example of race and class negotiation in which organizations such as the Black Panther Party, the Young Lords, and the Young Patriots Organization joined forces. Other discussions and contributions explore poetry, performance, and socially engaged art—which, broadly speaking, finds its foundation in the histories and language of community organizing. What is the role of politics and poetics in complicating and clarifying these ongoing conversations—the ones that happen when people come together?
• • •
With contributions by: Amber Art & Design, Rashayla Marie Brown, Emily Chow Bluck, Billy “Che” Brooks, Salem Collo-Julin, Irina Contreras, Brad Duncan, Bettina Escauriza, Eric J. Garcia, Maria Gaspar, Thomas Graves, Robby Herbst, Jen Hofer, Alethea Hyun-Jin Shin, Mike James, Marissa Johnson- Valenzuela, Jennifer Kidwell, Antonio Lopez, Nicole Marroquin, Fred Moten, Matt Neff, Mark Nowak, Edward Onaci, Dave Pabellon, Mary Patten, Rasheedah Phillips, Anthony Romero, Frank Sherlock, Amy Sonnie, Hy Thurman, Thread Makes Blanket, James Tracy, Daniel Tucker, the University of Louisville’s Anne Braden Institute for Social Justice Research, Dan S. Wang, Jakobi Williams, Mariam Williams, Rosten Woo, Wooden Leg Print & Press, Works Progress with Jayanthi Kyle, and Rebecca Zorach.
This book was produced out of the exhibition of the same name curated by Daniel Tucker. This catalog was edited by Anthony Romero, designed by Josh MacPhee, and published by Soberscove Press.
Printed on three different paper stocks, in three different spot colors plus a full color section.

Security

Josh MacPhee

November 2016

Format

Apparel

2-color screen printed bandana

A wearable bandana version of my Cameras print. Both pretty and terrifying. Works as a scarf, bandana, back patch, or many other creative fashion endeavors!

Printed at Kingsland Printing in Brooklyn, NY.