Flag Design for the Pro Choice Movement
A flag is a symbolic distillation of ideas, values, and meaning representing a community, group, or movement. Through explorations and iterations I defined, researched, and designed a flag representing the pro choice movement. Through this process I was able to develop an iterative process by integrating perceptual and conceptual understandings of form, color, symbolism, and imagery.
The flag is based on the Pro-Choice Movement and their values that include the following:
“Reproductive rights are essential for achieving gender equality. Reproductive freedom means having affordable access to all reproductive health care options, including birth control and abortion care. It also means supporting people who choose to work while pregnant and those raising families.”
The colors are meant to mimic the white, yellow and purple in the Women’s suffrage flag that existed in the late 19th century and are altered to have a redder, more visceral sentiment while still maintaining lighter tones often considered to be more feminine. The general composition of the flag is meant to resemble a minimalist view of a woman’s pelvis. Within the composition, the flag depicts a juxtaposition of the venus symbol and the caduceus. The venus symbol has been appropriated to represent women, as it is said to resemble a bronze mirror with a handle. The medical symbol is derived from the caduceus, which is the traditional symbol for Hermes and features two snakes wrapping around a winged staff. However, the symbol for Caduceus is commonly misused as the symbol for medicine instead of the Rod of Asclepius, which is strikingly similar. Rod of Asclepius is a serpent-entwined rod wielded by the Greek god Asclepius, a deity associated with healing and medicine. However, for my flag I chose to continue to use the caduceus to symbolize healthcare. The Rod of Asclepius is associated with Hippocrates, who is considered to be the father of medicine but problematically acknowledges the immorality of killing an unborn child. More than a thousand years before, the Mosaic law in the Hebrew Scriptures recognized the unborn child as a person. To deviate from the depiction of the single serpent that refers to Hippocraties is an effort to reclaim the symbol of health care to be inclusive to women’s health in a field that is overrun by patriarchal values.
