WEAR A MASK
date: label: date made
content: 2020
name: label: maker
content: Berkel, Brandon
label: maker
content: Perrault, Molly
label: maker
content: Telluride Council for the Arts and Humanities
notes: label: Description
content: On March 11, 2020, the World Health Organization (WHO) declared that the COVID-19 outbreak had become a pandemic. In the weeks that followed, many state and local governments began to provide Americans with information about how to best protect themselves. Much of this information was shared via social media but state and local governments also continued to use paper, cardboard, and/or vinyl posters to provide crucial information about the virus.
label: Description
content: Using posters to promote public service announcements (PSAs) has a long history in the United States and many communities drew on this history when creating images for their posters. Some communities adopted, as has been a long practice, a humorous approach to sharing information while still other communities developed posters and images that reflected their specific community. The posters used in the town of Telluride reflect both a humorous approach as well as imagery which specifically reflects the community and history of Telluride.
label: Description
content: Telluride is a resort town in Southwestern Colorado with a full-time population of less than 2,500. Situated at the end of a box canyon, the town can be entered via only one road (Colorado E. Highway 145). Following the emergence of the pandemic, Telluride Arts, a non-profit focused on the arts, partnered with the Town of Telluride, San Miguel County, the San Miguel County Health Director, and other local partners to keep the Telluride community safe and businesses open. Telluride Arts advocated for the use of local artists to design posters for the public health campaign.
label: Description
content: In mid-March of 2020, Branden Berkel, a local artist whose work had been featured by the Telluride Arts District in 2019, designed this and other signs in collaboration with Molly Perrault, another local artist and the programs director at Telluride Arts. Berkel and Perrault had become “bummed” when the Free Box, wooden bins and shelves located on a sidewalk just off Telluride’s main street, was closed because of the pandemic. Telluride residents saw the Free Box, which people used to exchange goods, as a symbol of the town itself. Determined to beautify the plywood that boarded up the Free Box, Berkel and Perrault developed the first unofficial public service COVID announcement, “This town ain’t big enough for the two of us,” as a guerilla art project.
label: Description
content: Impressed by the design used on the Free Box plywood cover, Telluride Arts reached out to Berkel, asking him to design a series of posters for Telluride’s anti-COVID-19 campaign. Ultimately, Berkel and Perrault, designed a banner which was installed above Colorado Avenue and eight large signs, of which this was one. Posters like this one were posted on Colorado E. Highway 145 as well as in the town itself. The posters, which became collectors’ items, were also sold by Telluride Arts. Ellen R. Kramer, a local architect with an association with Telluride Arts, bought these posters and hung them in a house in Newport Beach, California.
label: Location
content: Currently not on view
place: label: place made
content: United States: Colorado, Telluride
topic: label: general subject association; used; web subject
content: COVID-19 (Disease)
label: associated subject
content: 2019 novel coronavirus disease
label: associated subject
content: Infectious diseases
label: associated subject
content: Public Health
label: associated subject
content: 2019-nCoV disease
label: associated subject
content: Disease prevention
label: related event
content: COVID-19 Pandemic, 2020-2023
setName: label: See more items in
content: Medicine and Science: Medicine
creditLine: label: Credit Line
content: Gift of Telluride Arts through Brandon Berkel and Ellen Kramer
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of American History
identifier: label: ID Number
content: 2022.0049.03
label: catalog number
content: 2022.0049.03
label: accession number
content: 2022.0049
objectType: label: Object Name
content: poster
label: Object Type
content: Poster
physicalDescription: label: Physical Description
content: paper (overall material)
label: Measurements
content: overall: 17 in x 11 in; 43.18 cm x 27.94 cm