“Voices of the People” exhibition at Woody Guthrie Center

On view through December 31, 2024, Voices of the People: 110+ Years of Political Stickers from the USA, features hundreds of stickers grouped by themes and dates. Click on an image and save it to a new tab to view stickers more closely.

Curator’s statement by Catherine Tedford

Publicly placed stickers with printed and hand-drawn images and text have been used for decades for creative expression and as an effective way to engage passersby. Often spotted at eye level or just beyond reach, stickers are hidden in plain sight, gracing every imaginable surface of the built environment—from street signs and utility poles to fence posts and garbage bins. Stickers also adorn laptops, water bottles, and musical instruments, appealing to diverse audiences through eye-catching visual designs and powerful messages that carry a punch. Though ephemeral by nature, stickers capture time and place’s creative, cultural, and sociopolitical pulse.

In the United States, as early as the 1910s, the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW), or “Wobblies,” created “stickerettes” or “silent agitators” to oppose poor working conditions, intimidate bosses, and condemn capitalism. Woody Guthrie’s involvement with the “One Big Union” began in the 1930s, as his music reflected IWW principles promoting worker solidarity. One of his most famous songs, “Union Maid,” was directly influenced by the IWW spirit, advocating for women’s rights within the labor movement. 

Other historical stickers in the exhibition focus on the war in Vietnam during the 1960s and ’70s, when organizations like Students for a Democratic Society (SDS), Vietnam Veterans Against the War, and the Spring Mobilization Committee to End the War in Vietnam utilized stickers to protest government policies, demand peace, and issue calls to action.

A series of LGBTQ stickers from the 1980s and ’90s demonstrate an urgency for gay rights during a time of intense advocacy in the face of AIDS. The iconic “Silence = Death” pink triangle and “ACT UP” slogans stressed the need for better medical research, funding, and treatment and called for an end to the stigma attached to HIV/AIDS. Messages of queer visibility and empowerment conveyed uncompromising assertions of identity and a refusal to be marginalized. The bright neon colors are unapologetically loud and direct.

Several stickers in the exhibition dating to the 2010s and 2020s focus on critical issues, including labor and workers’ rights, nature and the environment, the Black Lives Matter movement, prison reform, and rights for women, immigrants, and transgender people. Stickers by Dignidad Rebelde, a West Coast graphic arts collaboration “grounded in Third World and Indigenous movements, … illustrate stories of struggle, resistance, and triumph.” The activist collective Slavers of New York uses stickers designed like street signs to document the enduring legacy of slavery in New York City.

In addition, “We the Future” stickers from the Amplifier Foundation, a “design lab that amplifies the voices of grassroots movements,” depict “young leaders at the forefront of change,” and Shepard Fairey’s Facing the Giant campaign features thirty beautifully crafted vinyl stickers based on his prints from the past three decades. Other groupings of stickers embody values expressed by musicians such as Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger: social justice, civic engagement, community building, and patriotism through the critique of injustice (and the power of the vote!).