작품 상세

(BLACK PANTHERS.) Guilty of Murder / Guilty of Brutality. [Los Angeles], circa 1966 Each 23 x 16¾ inches; minimal wear and foxing.   A pair of posters for the Community Alert Patrols formed to protect Black residents in the wake of Watts starting in June 1966. The patrols rushed to the scene when police were reported in the area, hoping to discourage abuse by bearing witness, a strategy which may seem timely today. One of these posters urges: "Stop the murder and beating of innocent people by the Los Angeles police and sheriffs! Stand together against lawless police." The other asserts: "The police are at war with our community . . . How many of us will they brutalize this year?" They each feature a pair of stylized black panthers, likely inspired by the ones introduced by the Lowndes County Freedom Organization the previous year. The work of these patrols helped inspire the formation of the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense in Oakland a few months later.  Watts is referenced in one poster: "Police murdered 34 of our brothers and sisters last August!" The contact phone number given on these posters, 750-5048, was also used in 1965 by SLANT (Self Leadership for All Nationalities Today), an organization formed in South Los Angeles in the wake of Watts.  Neither traced in OCLC or at auction. Gordon Parks photographed one of the "Guilty of Brutality" posters tacked to a wall in 1967.