One of my favorite traditions associated with the annual Square Lake Festival is the screen print poster. We’ve commissioned a screen print poster from a local artist ever since 2005, when my buddy Casey Brewer connected me with Wes Winship at Burlesque of North America. It’s like opening a present each year when Angela, Stella, Naomi and I see the poster for the first time. Delivering it to Twin Cities’ area records stores and coffee shops is a rare pleasure. I get to describe the festival to someone while we’re both looking at the limited edition poster…each one signed, numbered and printed on paper with some personality. Some businesses managers, like Bob Fuchs at The Electric Fetus, even offered to frame the poster and then put it in their front window. Peace Coffee gets credit too. Peace Coffee bike-delivers copies of the posters to about 50 area coffee shops. I couldn’t ask for anything more.
We’re in no rush with the Square Lake Festival. We would much rather have fewer posters that people frame and display in their homes for decades than a pile of cheap prints in the recycling bin after the event.
But this would not be possible without artists like Erica Williams who goes beyond the call of duty with their skills to support the festival. 2014 was the very first time that we felt compelled to work with the same artist two years in a row. Life is short. Why overthink the stuff that works? Erica Williams designed the 2013 poster, and it was an absolute pleasure working with her again this year. You may have noticed, but we’re building the story of the mythological creatures that inhabit the aquatic and celestial regions around Square Lake.
Enjoy these photos of Erica while she was making this year’s poster and visit her booth at Square Lake where she’ll have some of her work for sale.
