An intricate and exquisitely hand-cut homage to the Red Flag, in an edition of 15 with comprehensive historical context described in an accompanying booklet. A powerful and delicate contemplation on how “la lotta continua.”

“The text of We’ll keep the red flag flying here is taken from the lyrics to the song The Red Flag, originally written by Irish political organizer Jim Connell during the London Dock Strike of 1889. The song is still sung by many communist and socialist parties across the globe, and a variation of it is used as the anthem of the Labour Party of the UK. I’m partial to the versions more recently popularized by British pop musicians Billy Bragg and Robert Wyatt. We’ll keep the red flag flying here emerges out of my research into both political music and the impact and usage of popular symbols on the Left (the red flag, the raised fist, etc.). Each page of the book was created by taking an existing cover design from a vinyl record—which featured red flags—and removing all the visual material except for the flags. I then hand cut the flag out of the visual field of the resulting new image, creating a book filled with both the presence and absence of this powerful symbol.

This booklet contains a portion of my original research, including images of the original record covers each page was derived from, in the order they appear in We’ll keep the red flag flying here.”
— Josh MacPhee, 2021