By Megan Robertson

Last month, in light of President Donald Trump’s military parade in Washington, D.C., an estimated 50,000 people took to the Mission District and Civic Center to call for “No Kings.” In the western neighborhoods, protests looked a little different.

More than 2,500 people gathered at Ocean Beach on the morning of June 14 to create a message with their bodies, spelling out the phrase “NO KING!” It was the 27th demonstration in activist Brad Newsham’s “human banner” series.

Since 2006, Newsham has been creating human banners, primarily on Ocean Beach, to call for political change.

“I had been one of those people who had been angrily tapping my typewriter, my laptop,” Newsham said. “I realized that this wasn’t working. It was all words, and it was all on screen. And what we needed was some art.”

Inspired by the views from airplane-window seats and the Google Earth aerial technology of the early 2000s, Newsham’s human banners came to life.

“I had this vision of people on Ocean Beach in San Francisco – where I have spent a lot of time – spelling out the word ‘impeach’ down on the sand, photographed from above, spelling it out with their bodies, with the Golden Gate Bridge in the background,” he said.

In the early years, the images were captured by a photographer in a low-flying helicopter. Today, more often than not, they use drones to take the images.

Newsham’s partner on the projects is architect Travis Van Brasch. Together, the two plan and mark out the letters of the image in the sand, based on how many people are expected to attend. The letters range from 25 to 100 feet in height.

“I wanted to create events that I would want to attend,” Newsham said. “It’s different than those massive rallies. Not to denigrate those at all, but this is a different thing. People come out to the beach, and they’re creating this message with their bodies, and they get it. (They) are singing and dancing, and they’re not getting yelled at by somebody that they’ve never heard of from this bad PA set.”

Outer Richmond resident and publicist Leigh Anne Varney had been attending the events for years before she stepped up and offered to do publicity for them.

“Every single time it’s just a really convivial, warm community,” she said. “People just want to introduce themselves. My daughters have come. There are children. There are dogs. It’s really warm and friendly.”

Before this spring, their last banner was in 2021. Newsham had begun to anticipate that it could be nearing the end, until Trump’s State of the Union address in early March. Newsham created a banner alleging “tyranny.” Since then, the group has shown no sign of stopping, creating banners that have read: “Flip Congress,” “Impeach and Resist,” “Hands Off Democracy” and “No King.”

This year, photos and stories about their banners have been shared around the world including the San Francisco Chronicle, New York Times, Washington Post, the Hindustan Times and Rolling Stone Magazine.

“It’s the icing on the cake, sitting back after it’s over and seeing it ripple around the world,” Newsham said. For those demonstrators pictured in Rolling Stone Magazine, he said with a laugh, they have “lifetime bragging rights.”

Varney’s favorite part of the events is what follows the making of the banner and photos.

“(Newsham) invites people to disband and walk down to the beach, the water’s edge, and hold hands and form a long line down Ocean Beach,” Varney said. “The last few have been really long. It’s pretty stunning.”

Throughout the past 19 years, the events have only gotten larger.

“It’s growing,” Van Brasch said. “I hope it continues to grow exponentially, doubling each time. For me, what it really does is it turns the fear into an exterior and positive force. It’s cathartic. When you come from one of these things, you’re lit up. You feel empowered. You’re not afraid anymore. You see that there is power in numbers. It’s a kind of a huge relief and a joyous jump.”

To learn more about the human banners and to be notified when the next event will take place, visit human-banners-at-ocean-beach.org.