The announcement for submissions to the “Free Patrick Zaki, prisoner of conscience” contest, a special edition of Poster For Tomorrow, was made in January 2021. It was coordinated by Amnesty International Italia, Conversazioni sul futuro, and Diffondiamo idee di valore in collaboration with Alma Mater Studiorum – University of Bologna, Articolo 21 Association, and the Human Rights Festival, with support from various public administrations and other partners. The contest aimed to unite people around the world who are advocating for the immediate release of Patrick Zaki, an Egyptian student who has been held in prison for nearly two years as a prisoner of conscience due to his work in promoting human rights and expressing his political views on social media (here more info>>).
I decided to focus the design of the poster on the concept of “attention”, through Patrick’s iconic face in vector portrait version: when events of human rights violations like this happen, I believe it is crucial to keep the public’s attention high, so that the pressure can be felt, peacefully and loudly, by the people responsible for the act. Given the large international participation, I am very happy that my poster was selected as one of the 30 finalists (see here the selection>>), and was displayed in various exhibitions and public billboards.
