This poster was created for Women's Day, a South African national holiday commemorating a 1956 demonstration in Pretoria. Thousands of women gathered to protest the apartheid government's pass laws, which required black South Africans to carry documents authorizing their presence in racially restricted areas. The text is based on a song that became the anthem of women’s struggle against apartheid and that today represents the strength of South African women in general. The poster was printed by Medu Art Ensemble, a collective of South African exiles and activists formed in 1978 in Gaborone, Botswana, eight miles across the South African border.

Gallery label from

Impressions from South Africa, 1965 to Now.

Medium Screenprinted poster
Dimensions composition (irreg.): 21 1/4 x 14 15/16" (54 x 38 cm); sheet: 23 5/8 x 16 9/16" (60 x 42 cm)
Designer Judy Seidman
Publisher Medu Art Ensemble, Gaborone, Botswana
Printer Medu Art Ensemble, Gaborone, Botswana
Edition approx. 300
Credit General Print Fund
Object number 434.2010
Department Drawings and Prints

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