“Darkness cannot drive out darkness, only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only Love can do that.” —MARTIN LURTHER KING, JR.

After the terrible terrorist attacks that happened in Paris, France this past weekend many people have been making statements and posting pictures and quotes on social media to keep everyone in their thoughts and prayers.

I first heard about the attacks from looking on my Instagram account and the first picture that showed up was a picture of the Eiffel tower and a peace symbol combined. At first I thought to myself, wow that is really clever. Then I read the caption to the picture and realized what the symbol was for and why so many people were posting it.

The Monday after the attacks I was again on social media. Browsing my twitter account this time I came across an article that AIGA put out about the peace/paris artist and the symbol that he created. The artist who created the “Peace for Paris” symbol goes by the name of Jean Jullien. I clicked on the article and learned a lot about the designer and the symbol just from reading what they had posted. Jean Jullien is a French graphic designer who lives London and upon his hearing of the attacks he says the design that he created was a reaction. There were no sketches that he made. He thought about peace and how right now Paris needed peace and then he thought of images that related to France, and the Eiffel tower is a huge one. Once he thought of those two he combined them to create the worldwide symbol to show support for Paris.

The level of simplicity is so powerful that it is instantly recognizable as showing peace for Paris. It’s a communication tool in which in times of crisis artists take their artistic ability to create images with meaning behind them.

Picture is taken from http://www.jeanjullien.com