State of Maryland Commission on Civil Rights Annual Report
In 2020, a landmark year for civil rights in the United States, the State of Maryland’s Commission on Civil Rights (MCCR) envisioned to upgrade its annual report. The goal was to make what had previously been a routine compendium of dense, departmentally prepared narrative, key statistics in standard bar and line graphs into an inspiring publication capturing the momentous events of the year.
PROJECT UNDER ASHTON DESIGN
ROLE Designer & Data Visualizer
STRATEGY & COPY Kim Carlin
APPRENTICE Sera Taylor (2021)
A landmark year for civil rights
In addition to the impact on MCCR’s activities of the global COVID-19 pandemic, the year was marked by worldwide global Black Lives Matter protests in the wake of the killing of George Floyd and the loss of Rep. John Lewis, a civil rights icon, shown above left on the historic march across the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Alabama.
Visual concept
Photography, typography, and infographics were all inspired by the Civil Rights movement of the 1960s.
The Martin typeface by Vocal Type Co. used for all headers was influenced by civil rights movement protest posters. Infographics throughout the annual report were inspired by the visually-striking graphics used in a sociologist and Black rights activist W.E.B. Du Bois’ Data Portraits: Visualizing Black America. The Maryland state flag provided the color palette and Calvert pattern theme.
infographics
Infographics were specially designed to reinforce key messages, highlight trends, and illustrate MCCR’s mission and reach. Case studies were integrated with data to put a human face on the numbers.
To allow MCCR to extend its outreach through social media platforms and its website, report highlights were reformatted for digital.
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