“Stop the Plant” by Woody Pirtle

This poster is titled “Stop the Plant” and was created by Woody Pirtle in 2003. Stop the Plant was a campaign to prevent the construction by St. Lawrence Cement of planting a huge cement plant in the Hudson Valley of New York. To create awareness of this issue, graphic designer and resident of the area Woody Pirtle created this ominous image of a plant with dark smoke coming out of it against the bright blue sky. He decides to put a skeleton face within the cloud of smoke, showing that this plant would be dangerous and could harm the environment around it. Thankfully the campaign was successful, and the plant was not built. This plant would have been over forty stories high and would have emitted 20 million pounds of air pollutants. This area is known for its incredible views, in which this plant would have disturbed with a smoke trail stretching over 6 miles long. This poster is successful because it is simple, yet gives a clear and powerful understanding of the message it is trying to get across. If you would like to see more of Woody Pirtle’s work, you can find it here – http://www.pirtledesign.com.