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Art in advertising Vox Pops

By The Drum, Administrator

February 9, 2010 | 7 min read

CRAIG BUZZEL, CREATIVE DIRECTOR, BIG COMMUNICATIONS

I’d be surprised if there were many people in advertising who seriously believe that when they create a piece of advertising they create a piece of art. The ones who do, I can imagine, would be rather unbearable to work with.

Sure, there are similarities in the techniques and processes used. But art exists for its own existence (or something like that); advertising is a definite means to a purchasing end. In advertising what you produce creatively is made according to a (hopefully tight) brief with a (usually tight) budget with an ultimate sales objective. We sell stuff; and if we’re not doing that we’re not doing our jobs properly. But, that’s not to say that advertising cannot be artistically produced. Or even, occasionally, beautiful. In any advertising job, the client’s objectives always come first, and we have to engage the particular audience we are tasked with talking to each and every time – not a bunch of art critics. (Unless it’s an ad aimed at a bunch of art critics.)

IAN BOULTER, CREATIVE DIRECTOR, CHAPTER

History tends to be a true indictor of what is art. Many great artists were not recognised in their lifetime and ground-breaking concepts can be ahead of critical thinking. With this in mind, it would be hard to argue that the commercial paintings of Toulouse-Lautrec and the film posters by Saul Bass are not art. I have no idea if Lautrec’s works were commercially viable but they have appeared in a million living rooms since and a very commercial director like Hitchcock would never have commissioned film posters that did not deliver for him. As to what recent work could be regarded as art now, my personal choice would be for Sony Bravia and Honda (Cogs, above). But history, of course, will decide...

RICH EDGERTON, CREATIVE DIRECTOR, SPERM CREATIVE

The notion of advertising being purely about “selling a product” invokes thoughts of a soulless unit sat on a shelf needing to be bought for a set price. This dumbs down what advertising should be about. Great advertising sells ideas, thoughts, and philosophies. An advert may sell an opportunity to make the world a better place, especially in the not-for-profit and renewable energy sectors. Advertising certainly has the power to change the world in the same way that art can. The creative industries get peoples’ hearts beating faster in anticipation of buying the latest sexy must have product. Our industry stimulates peoples’ sight, taste and hearing with innovative creative products every day.

PHIL HOWELLS, CREATIVE DIRECTOR, THE RAFT

Advertising is heavily influenced by the type of people involved in the game. Generally, account handlers are frustrated creatives and creatives are frustrated artists, film directors, novelists and screenwriters. From my own experience, I had to make a decision between fine art and graphic design. Money and careers are rare in the fine art game, so I made the decision to become an art director. So you could say that I am influenced by art. And I’m often inspired by it too. So art certainly has a big part to play in advertising. But first and foremost, advertising is about selling a product.

GUY VICKERSTAFF, HEAD OF ARTIFARTINESS, THE LEITH AGENCY

Advertising isn’t Art. Let’s get that straight from the start.

Some kinds of advertising become Art the older they get. Henri de Toulouse Lautrec’s posters for the Moulin Rouge are Art. But they weren’t when he did them. Advertising seems only to become Art once it ceases to be advertising.

Advertising is created as a commercial venture. Someone has paid for that message to be created. Or if it hasn’t been paid for, the media in which it’s running has been. Art isn’t. Art is created to be Art.

Don’t get me wrong, some advertising is unspeakably beautiful, profound and deeply moving. But it isn’t Art. It’s really good advertising.

Whether advertising is Art or not isn’t the interesting bit of this debate for me. The interesting bit is where the line between advertising and Art becomes blurred. As a culture we are now all so ad-literate that we can sniff the whiff of ‘Ad’ a mile off. And because of this, some of the most breathtaking advertising work in the last few years seems to sit somewhere in that blurry middle ground. Cadbury’s Gorilla, Sony Balls (below), the National Gallery Grand Tour campaign, the Glue Factory’s melted Ice Cream van, Levi’s viral giant puppet film. All advertising, but profoundly unlike anything we’d seen before. Advertising through its execution is so beautiful, understated and original you forget it’s advertising. It makes the world a better place. Who wouldn’t want to create something like that?

DAVE PALMER, LOVE

If advertising was purely about selling products you’d need salesmen, not creatives. Having said that, it’s dangerous and usually pompous for ad agencies to consider what they do as ‘art.’ And it’s dangerous to assume that art is somehow elevated above what our industry does. Like advertising, there’s a lot of bad art about – just visit St Ives if you don’t believe me. I think it is extremely healthy for advertising and design creatives to consider themselves artists. We were, after all, once called commercial artists – maybe we should revert to this?

CARL PUGH, CREATIVE DIRECTOR, HEADFIRST

Some ads of recent times use such amazing photographers that their work (for me) has become art – Annie Leibovitz’s work for Louis Vuitton (the Core Values campaign, below) is incredible.

I’d say though that because, mostly, there is a lack of innovation in ads the element of art tends to be missing. Advertising often “borrows” from art but rarely does it contribute – except perhaps when famous people called Saatchi become patrons.

For advertising, great work is work that sells the product or raises awareness or ticks any of the boxes defined by the client. The “we buy any car” campaign aint pretty but I’d be willing to bet it is effective – and that’s what I (if I were the client or the agency) would call great.

But this also suggests that art isn’t about selling. Which is wrong. Art has to sell itself. It is the product and the ad in itself. It needs to attract attention to make sell itself or bring money in for the gallery owners.

GELLAN WATT, THINKING JUICE

It’s not just hard sell in advertising. Blood, sweat, tears are given by the people that work in the business. People that care passionately about what they do. But advertising is purely about selling. It exists for no other reason, and neither should it. That said, in the promotion of a product, the interruption of the average Joe / Jo from watching Coronation Street and the pursuit of penetrating people’s lives and creating a lasting impression ‘Art’ is one of the tools in the box that can be used to do each of those things, when appropriate. But of course, advertising itself IS an art... ‘The Art of Persuasion’.

I got a Campaign Turkey a few months back. The industry slated one of my commercials. What did the client get? 181% growth in sales, a massive ROI and an ad that consumers loved. Of course, that’s not to excuse us from worrying about the craft of what we do.

The craft is part of the positioning... look at some of the best ever TV ads Guiness ‘Surfer’, Honda ‘Cog’ – beautiful artistic executions. Perfect for the brands. Then look at Cilit Bang, or the old school Sunny D ads – god awful... but bloody successful. That’s an art in itself.

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