[Red Army Faction, Baader-Meinhof] Four Large Posters Supporting Astrid Proll

Item #SQ7423850

London: Friends of Astrid Proll Campaign, [1978]. Four extremely large posters, each 36 x 25 in. Offset in black ink on white uncoated stock.

Four large posters printed to be pasted around London in support of Astrid Proll, foundational member of the Red Army Faction, who was then fighting extradition to Germany on charges of bank robbery and attempted murder.

Proll was arrested in Germany in 1971 and escaped to London in 1974, living underground in Hackney until 1978 when she was caught, detained by London police, and slated for extradition to face trial in West Germany. The Friends of Astrid Proll Campaign, organized by those who had known and worked with Proll under her new identity, Anna Puttick, formed almost immediately, and successfully delayed her extradition until she voluntarily decided to return to Germany. Living under her assumed name, “Anna Puttick” had apparently given up militant revolutionary activity and worked as a vocational teacher for underprivileged kids in the Hackney and Hempstead neighborhoods. The attempted murder charges were ultimately dropped, and Proll was found guilty of bank robbery and falsifying documents.

These informational and text-heavy posters offer background on her alleged offenses, exculpatory details, criticisms of her original trial and imprisonment, and first-person testimonials from those who knew her.

The arrest and ensuing organizing efforts coincided and reflect the early punk scene of the late 1970s. The posters are documents of the cross-fertilization between East London’s radical politics and early anarcho-punk, and clearly reflect the nascent punk aesthetic brought to wider popularity by bands like Crass, The Clash, Subhumans, and Poison Girls.

Rare. OCLC notes six locations for the poster titled “Freedom for Astrid Proll” as of March 2022, but the remaining three pieces are unrecorded. Fold lines from storage and some creasing but clean and without loss. All very good.

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