This is a series of four posters produced by local artists and designers and distributed across the
Toronto area. As the name suggests, the posters have a strongly utilitarian purpose, and deal
very directly with current social and political issues, ranging from the personal to interventionist strategies.
The post-revolutionary avant-garde in the twenties marked a shift away from easel art towards
the graphic arts, like posters and murals. Posters in particular were attractive to avant-garde
artists because they marked the entrance of art into the stream of everyday life. Posters, freed
from the traditional confines of both the visual and aural arts, became a vehicle for political
communication, street art accessible to all.
The objective of Posters Mean Business comes under the rubric of investigation. It was the
intent of the collective to produce well designed posters which demonstrate a high level of
experimentation in terms of overall design and form of address, and also in strategies of direct
address and its context. The four posters selected were chosen from over sixty works submitted
to Public Access.
Artists