“Every country used poster art historically to motivate engagement in one way or another,” says Laurie Norton-Moffat, CEO/executive director of the Norman Rockwell Museum in Stockbridge, Massachusetts. As get-out-the-vote activity is reaching fever pitch, the Norman Rockwell Museum has launched the Unity Project 2024, a digital campaign using the power of illustration to foster civic engagement and participation through art.

The digital poster campaign builds on the success of the Museum’s Unity Project non-partisan voting initiative in 2020. Now, as in four years ago, the Museum has commissioned posters from some of the top illustrators in the country.

“Not only did the Unity Project reach millions of viewers, but it was a wonderful new way to work with illustrators,” says Norton-Moffatt.

Like Rockwell himself, the six Unity Project 2024 artist-collaborators share a dedication to illustration art as a vehicle for artistic expression and social change. Images include a stylized American flag that becomes a voting booth, a hand rising up inscribed with determined faces, and young people collaborating to create a vibrant mural with a strong voting message.

The posters are being rolled out on social media, with a new artist/poster released every few weeks so that the campaign will grow and build. The final release will happen about 10 days before the election.

“The distribution campaign relies on social media,” Norton-Moffatt says. Along with the regular social media channels, she adds, “dissemination of the images is happening with influencers who are civic minded and aligned with the Museum’s mission.”

The public is invited to download the images and share widely, which the Unity Project website makes easy to do. There are links to voting tools on registering to vote and checking registration status. The Museum is partnering with several dozen organizations across the country, including the League of Women Voters and Rock the Vote, to reach and motivate millions of prospective voters.

The original artwork is on view now as a featured installation in Norman Rockwell Museum’s lobby through election season. Over time, the posters from 2020, 2024 and the future will build a new collection in the Museum’s illustration archives.

The Unity Project (both this year and four years ago) is made possible through the generosity of the Wadsworth family of North Adams. “Vote! It’s your privilege and your duty. Norman Rockwell understood this, as do these six amazing contemporary illustrators,” says Jack Wadsworth.