rār (pronounced rare) builds authentic campaigns, utilizing a creative mix of marketing and public relations/social strategies. Their customized solutions help clients to engage global multicultural communities and consumers.

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Ask

Create an evergreen social campaign for heritage months that could also be used to showcase local entrepreneurs and community leaders.

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Solution
I designed the campaign and tagline with Fredrick Douglass as my inspiration. He is the most photographed American of the nineteenth century. Douglass despised drawings portraying Black people with exaggerated features — slack-jawed expressions, or as giddy slaves. Douglass knew these images only served to reinforce white supremacy by presenting Black people as simple-minded and subjugated. He realized that by posing for dozens of portraits, he could show what Black freedom and dignity looked like. Each photograph allowed him to control his identity and be seen as a human on equal footing with all men.
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For Black History Month, I chose simple clean portraits on a black background to remove all the noise. I wanted the viewer to linger on each face and see the depth, strength, and beauty in each face. After exploring more traditional African American heritage colors (red, black, and green) I settled on black and yellow. It afforded the most contrast in the composition as well as the instantaneous correlation to the Black Lives Matter movement of 2020.