Creative subversive ads

Creative subversive ads 

Subversive advertising is not the advertisements you might encounter every day. There are plenty of adverts which take a twist of the original ad and gives a meaning that is the opposite. They tend to be more extreme than the original and makes people think more and harder about what is actually being advertised at them. 

Examples of subversive ads:

Adbusters.org

http://weburbanist.com/subversive-marketing-and-other-culture-jamming/

https://www.adbusters.org/spoofads/

OUCA401

The 1980´s context of advertising

Aim for the seminar:
Understand cultural, aesthetic, social and technological contexts of the 80´s.
Understand some key aspects of romantic model of creativity.
Define postmodern advertising.

Economic & Political
S&S Became the world´s largest advertising firm
Context of privatisation
It was the time of Raegan & Thatcher
Recession and unemployment (1981)
Historian Lord Hennessy "uncanny" similarities between the riots of 1981 and 2011
1982 election state industries sold; gas, water & electricity.
Financial deregulation
Big Bang 1986 removal restrictions London stock exchange.
Growth in the finance and service sectors

Social context
"Unemployment topped three million in 1982"
The january 1982 figure of 3,070,621 represented 12.5 per cent of the working population

New identities
Boom mid 80´s
Yuppies 1986 bang (young upwardly mobile professionals)
They had lots of money and was a well used target group when it came to marketing products.
"now in their fifties and sixties but the rampant materialism shows little sign of abating" (reporter, 2010)
Early 80´s caused an ad boom
"it lined the pockets of all kinds of creative companies, designer brand thinkers and, of course, advertising. it was the decade that embraced the value of brands as a competitive necessity"

New man, New woman, New sexuality & New romantics
The man was portrayed as more androgynous. He was showing this softer side that was looked at as less masculine. The calvin klein ad from the 1980´s show a man posing with a child that was new. The new woman became more confident and in fashion this was showed with the famous Armani power suit. There was more women working in banking and finance - high powered jobs (UK&USA). After the hard imagery of the late 1970´s punk, Vivienne Westwood created her nostalgic, neo - romantic Pirate Collection from 1980.

from lecture presentation

Post modern creaive ads:
- 1984 Apple Mac Chiat/Day Grand Prix Cannes.
- Twister
- VW.
- Sleepy time 1989

Global tv & language
Music television launched in 1981
MTV American cable and satellite television channel (viacom) New York City.
24HR Music videos
MTV was one of the first truly global TV brands.
Music videos crossed global borders
Global language - audience; youth
The 80´s gave rise to the MTV generation
Brands looks, voice reached global audience
BBH´S work on levis meant that we were at the forefront of this blobal phenomenon
Two implications:
1) Brands targeting youth audience `could now be fun from one place`
2) The need to think beyond the borders of the UK.

from lecture presentation

OUCA401

Shape - shifting 70´s

Aim for the seminar: Understand cultural, aesthetic and economic contexts of the 70´s and define contextual influences upon ads in the 70´s. Also compare contextual influences upon ads in the 00´s. 

Social & Cultural

The DIY culture emerged from the subculture Punk. Many fashion labels especially Vivienne Westwood took inspiration from the subculture into their fashion. The brand had a fashion line called Let It Rock that was influenced by New York Dolls. Subculture style "offends the silent majority". The meaning of this style reflected attitude of youth movement towards a system that offered "no future". 

Economic & Political Context

Unemployment in 1972 was above 1 million, and that was the first time since the 30´s. 

1977 was the protest era. 

Union Strikes

Women´s liberal movement

National Women´s Liberation Movement

This was prompted by the civil rights in USA. 

100´s conferences resulted in legislation 1970 Equal Pay Act.

Specifying equal pay for equal work was implemented in 1975.

Ad campaign - The Makethempay (2014) campaign created by the the advertising agency Mother London was created to bring the issue of equal pay for equal work. 

Another Best Ad Ever (1969)

"His (Jeremy Sinclair) idea not only answered the brief brilliantly, but also became a symbol of changing sexual attitudes throughout the 70´s and the impetus for the launch of Saatchi & Saatchi... not bad for a bloke with a cushion stuffed up his jumper" 

- (Hegarty, 2011,p26)

More ad classics:

- Collins

-WCRS

- The Ultimate Driving Machine Series For BMW

- I Bet He Drinks Carling Black Label

Saatchi & Saatchi

Opened its doors in 1970. 

Hefarty 26, Maurice (Writer campaign) 23, Charles 28.

Charles: Creatively- led agency.

Hired Ron Collins "a gifted but flawed art director" from Collett Dickenson Pearce (CDP)

Always in the ad magazine Campaign.

S&S had no account men

They created some award - winning work

Hegarty left S&S in 1973 and became Creative Director at TBWA.

1975 Labour Isn´t Working AD

This ad has become a part of the political history of the UK, re - engaged the agency with its creative spirit. 

"We where out to change not only advertising, but also business of advertising" 

- (p137, Hegarty, 2011)

SUMMARY 

Social & cultural context was a reaction to greater economic and political turbulence. 

70´s younger generation created subcultures visually distinct subversive and satirical. 

Postmodern architecture ads 

Sculpture - stretched. 

Tv advertising entertaining against gloom

OUCA401

Wonderbra ad research for essay

Created in 1994
Model: Eva Herzigova

I wanted to use this as considered research for my essay as it touches on feminism and beauty in the 1990´s. I thought this would be relevant for my chosen topic on notions of beauty and class in advertising. The ad was not made to degrade women, but empower them. The model is portrayed as a woman that is knowingly playing with her sexuality, not becoming a sexualised object.

"My Wonderbra campaign empowered women. It didn´t degrade them like some said or say. It was controversial at the time, sure - but it made waves and you can see its influence still today. It was one of the most successful advertising campaigns in history and i am so proud to be a part of it." - Eva Herzigova

http://www.standard.co.uk/news/world/eva-herzigova-wonderbra-ad-empowered-women-9875267.html 

The 1990´s & United Colors of Benetton Ads

These two adverts by the fashion brand United Colors Of Benetton is two good examples of creating adverts with a strong meaning and works for globally. I wanted to publish them here on my blog as examples on how you can make strong visuals work for an international target audience. This relates back to the creative brief. 

The meaning behind these ads might not be as understandable today due to their context. They only had impact in the time they where made. The one with the baby was created during the Gulf war (1990 - 1991), and the second one shows a man dying of Aids that was the number one cause of death for us men 25- 44 in 1992. These was huge social issues and happenings that the majority of people knew of and by "commenting" on these real life events showed that the brand was socially conscious. 

Both the ads show something that can be understood by everyone. Everyone is born and will have an encounter with death or someone close dying. 

Created by: Creative Director Oliver Toscani

 OUCA401

Liverpool Trip - Tate gallery

This is pictures i took of a interesting piece i saw when visiting Tate gallery in Liverpool 15th February, 2017. This is a piece i found in the Tracy Emin and William Blake in Focus exhibition. 

I wanted to document my finding here on the blog so that i could consider it as research for my essay on the topic discussing notions of beauty in advertising. 

"In each of these works an image from a women´s fashion magazine is framed alongside a photograph of the artist. Her actions and poses appear to mimic those in the found magazine pages, but the photographs are in fact pictures that existed in Ivekovic´s personal collection, often taken months or even years before the magazines were published. Part of a series called Double Life, originally published as an artist´s book, these works comment on the invasive effect mass media imagery on women´s lives while also commenting on the disparity between such images and the rituals and interactions that compose everyday life. " (Figure 4)

Mass media / Sexuality / Cliché

OUCA401

Deconstruct an Ad

Client: Colgate Dental Floss
Agency: Cerebro Y&R, Panama

What you see in the adverts are two kinds of different fruits that normally carry small seeds. However, in this ad the seeds has fallen out of the fruit and is placed right in front of it. The product that is advertised for is small and placed in the corner so that the focus is on the fruit. The advert is strongly based on art direction because there is no copy in the ad. The image gives out a strong message without using any words.

Image of Kiwi - Signified
Word Kiwi - Signifier
= Sign Kiwi

The denotation of the ad is the seedless fruits Kiwi and strawberry that is represented in the ad. The connotation of the seedless fruits is that fruit is a symbol of something healthy. This fits well with the client, Colgate Dental Floss which represents healthy teeth. They have also decided to use fruits with tiny seeds that is quite hard to remove if you tried, and that is why the seeds gives the ad meaning. The fruits and their seeds stand for what the product does.

Overall, what you understand from the ad is that the product which is Colgate Dental Floss is so good that it can remove the tiniest bits of any food in your mouth without any problem.

OUCA401

Advertising & New Media

The aim for the lecture was to join the conversation surrounding new media, communication and creativity.

Traditional media or old media as some prefer to say has been used in both the advertising and marketing world for many years. In advertising old media is television, news papers, radio and magazine ads. We can look at these forms of old media as the roots of advertising. Old media is effective, but over the years there has been a change in the way of how to communicate with and reach consumers. New media is the future of advertising. Consumers and businesses tend to rely on new media as the digital world grows. You can say that new media is content that is easily accessible via many different forms of digital media. In advertising this can be different forms of online advertising, online streaming and social media advertising as we see much of. The positive is that you have a bigger capability to reach any consumer with ease.

Mobile phones is an interactive mass media as the internet is and that means that advertisers frequently take use of this device to use different viral marketing methods. That means that adverts or viral videos can be send forward to other people, it can be shared. This allows the consumer to be a part of the advertising experience.

"Mobile phones will soon become the greatest tool for persuasion, more than any other medium for advertising" (Fogg, 2003) 

"Shareability creates social content that cultivates deep emotional relationships between brands and their consumers." www.shareability.com (2016)

19th century emotive strategy:
This can be characterised by persuasion and impressions you get out of the advertisements. An example is ad A Dress Rehearsal (1888) a painting bought and used as an ad for Sunlight soap. Emotional strategy enhanced by naturalism of Newlyn school (Cornwall) persuaded use of Sunlight soap, mass media.

21th century emotive strategy:
This is characterised by engagement. It works not through persuasion or impressions but through engagement and involvement. And you have all different types of medias you can use to engage. The consumer wants to be a part of something. Feature and distribution.

"New media invited us to think in exciting new ways about advertising, as an industry and communication process" (Spurgeon, 2008)


OUCA401

Class

What is class?

Class is a construct based on a set of values normally related back to both wealth and power. It works as the hierarchical stratification of groups of people. Normally these groups are working, middle and upper class in a pyramid structure. 

"The history of all human society, past and present, has been the history of class struggle"

- Manifesto

Marx, K. The Communist

London: Pluto 

Press, 1996

Marxist theory of class

Karl Marx was a German philosopher, economist and social scientist. His thoughts about labour, capital and power is what forms the basis of Marxism. 

The ruling class has material force because it has the means to produce material objects. He called all things relating to production the Base. 

He defined three classes:

Proletariats (Working class - those who work for means of production)

Bourgeoisie (Middle class - those who live off the means of production)

Aristocracy (Upper class - those who own land etc as means of production)

"Moving beyond Marx, but still moving alongside but not wholly within economics, class is made through cultural values premised in morality embodied in personhood and realised (or not) as a property value in symbolic systems of exchange"

- (Skeggs, B. 2005, reacting to Reality Tv)

OUCA401

Levi's Laundrette Ad

Client: Levis Strauss co 
Agency: BBH

Levi's wasn't trendy anymore because it was under attack by other more fashionable brands and it had been a common jeans brand to be worn by middle - aged dads. The brands intended target audience for the 501 jeans was 15 - 19 year olds. The target audience saw the 50's and 60's as the cool and mythical america. It was either making a campaign based on this insight or go for an ad that fitted the jeans in a america of Ronald Reagan, which was the opposite of MTV and european chic. 

“I remember that the ad was running at a cinema before a movie, and I hadn’t seen it on the tely at that point. So I went to the cinema just to see the ad…” she says.“The commercial made those jeans sexy at a time when Levi’s were struggling to make their product appealing to women of my age, and really that’s where the big spenders come from. Suddenly those jeans became a must-heve item! I only wanted them because Nick Kamen wore them and took them off…” - Kate Thornton, a famous English journalist

How is this ad post modern?
The ad was so far from ordinary for it's time. The ad played a lot on sexuality with casting Nick Kamden and making him take his clothes off making the girls flustered. Using sexuality in this way was typical for the style of post modernists. It takes you back to the 50's and wanted to give people memories of that time, reminiscing back to that time was unusual for the age. It will say that the sexual humour and context of the scenes represents post modernism. There is no copy in the ad, only a song Through The Grape Wine by Marvin Gaye. 
The ad was influenced by MTV's music videos which only launched the year before. The ad looked more like a music video than an ad. This links back to new technology which at that time was looked at as post modern. 

Kanye Wests Yeezy season 3 fashion show and album release have some of the same post modern influences. In stead of a tv ad, he created an event that was held at Madison square garden. He did something we had not seen before and released both his clothing line and album in the same show. The way he presented it was not traditional for this time. He had all his models separated by gender and on two big stages. The show also commented on political issues, it was influenced by the context. The fashion line in general are fairly androgynous and neutral in the colour scheme. 

Levi's "Laundrette" 

OUCA401

Ugly / Beauty

The aim of the lecture was to understand how we define what beauty and ugly is and that they are binary opposites further relating this to art practice.

Binary opposites are used to structure stories. It is two positions that are opposites of each other, and gives any stories conflict. Examples are folk stories, fairytales, film or books and other kinds of stories and narratives used in media, advertising or news. Binary thinking also structures cultural and philosophical thinking. Narratives like this transmits rather powerful ideologies that results in us internalising (making natural) values of beauty, class and gender. Jaques Derrida is a deconstructionist thinker and argued that one side always have more power than the other - they do not have an equal relationship. Examples of cultural binaries are:

- Nature / Culture
- Human / Animal
- Good / Evil

The experience or perceptions of beauty or ugliness can be subjective but may of our ideas of beauty and its opposite ugly are deeply constructed within our society. As small children we are exposed to different imagery and narratives that forms our ideas of what beauty is. There is little diversity when it comes to what beauty is because the images that is generated in a western euro / US society represent a very narrow idea of what beauty is all about. There is a set standard. Beauty is a desirable attribute in females, and for men wealth and power is looked at as desirable. All of this becomes naturalised due to the images are multiple and repeated.

The ideas of beauty has changed over time and it has become more broad and diverse. It is experimental and opens up for imperfections and different perspectives. Contemporary artists have used this as an artistic strategy to subvert ideas about conventional notions of beauty.

Contemporary advertising is more diverse when it comes to beauty. Some brands promote what we see as positive and real beauty where other brands promotes the opposite which is a unhealthy body image. There is a conflict going on between these two binary opposites because our perception of what beauty and ugly is change over time.

OUCA401