This is one of four posters I created for my final thesis at New Design School. With each of these posters, I felt that the original theatrical posters didn't fit the mood, message, or energy of the films. My goal was to represent the films more accurately. The major obstacle was the fact that there were little or no adequate screen captures from the films available to me. My solution was to take either a stylized illustrative or typographical approach with each design.

"American History X" stars Edward Norton as Derek Vinyard, a high ranking member of a group of skinheads. When two black men attempt to steal his car, he kills one of them and ends up going to prison. In Prison he comes to realize that everything he believed as a white supremacist was a lie. After being released from prison, Derek is determined to make up for his own past and prevent his brother, Danny (Edward Furlong), from following in his footsteps.

With this design, I've presented the negative connotations of racism juxtaposed with the alternatives to a life filled with hate and fear. Also, it's important to note that the swastika wasn't a negative symbol until the Nazis took it for their own. So, for the negative aspects brought about by that group I used a deep red. These traits are depicted as cracking and peeling apart to represent their inherent corrosiveness. For the positive traits which result from a life free from racism and all that it brings — I went with a much mellower and more comforting yellow. The brick wall background represents the street level of the physical conflict within the film and the inherent dangers of that environment.

This is a student project and no profit has ever been or ever will be made from it.