14/11/08WILL WE LIVE TO SEE A BLACK D&AD PRESIDENT?![]() It looks unlikely. 06/10/08Courage rewardedThe end of this month will mark three years since my then agency, Hill/Holliday Boston, pitched to Liberty Mutual, the US’s eighth largest insurance company (now sixth) the idea that it should base its positioning upon its commitment to doing the right thing: to make its unshakeable sense of responsibility its organising idea. The clients, to their credit, didn’t take much persuading - the company’s outstanding CEO, in particular, immediately seeing the potential internal as well as external benefits of publicly celebrating the company’s defining cultural trait. But at the time it was a very gutsy move from a commercial perspective. For in the autumn of 2005, responsibility wasn’t sexy. Risk-taking was. The new positioning, anchored around the line, ‘Responsibility. What’s your policy?’ launched in May 2006. Its call for both companies and consumers to consider the role of responsibility in their corporate and individual actions struck an immediate and resonant chord with the American public. The call quickly took on a life of its own, moving within months from a corporate ad campaign, to a community website, to an abstract public movement (’The Responsibility Project’) involving film-makers and leading public policy figures alike. By the end of 2007, ‘Responsibility’ had become a Business Week case study. ![]() Right now there isn’t a single financial services company in America that wouldn’t kill to be associated with an operating philosophy of responsible business, responsible lending, responsible underwriting. 29/08/08N evil le Brody's D&ad Annual![]() It’s out in a couple of weeks, and according to D&Ad’s magazine Ampersand - Neville doesn’t think much of advertising and as a consequence he’s separated the design and advertising disciplines. He then ran off sniggering, pushing copywriters into bushes, and later left all the taps running in the mens loos at Fallon. What a rascal! The thing I don’t get is why such a talented designer has a bee in his bonnet about advertising, and it’s been there for over twenty years? It surely can’t be that most advertising is crass, patronising and derivative. Because so is most design. Maybe his view of Advertising is solely based on Shake‘n’Vac jingles and small space ads for Leatherland and the like? But that would be like me judging the world of design based on the latest pack design for Aunt Bessie’s Yorkshire Puddings. Oops, my mistake, it’s ‘Digital Vs Anti Digital’. Get it? D - Digital, AD – Anti Digital. But what does ‘Anti-Digital’ mean? D&AD President and Digital bod Simon Waterfall said, “The theme of ‘Digital vs Anti Digital’ represents the evolution of the digital industry. Clients and creatives are moving away from ‘Can we do this technically?’ to ‘Should we do this for the brand?’. Digital design today is more joined up, more integrated and more about brand behavior than bits and bytes - what a great time to be a part of this industry.” Are there people in the communications business who are ‘Anti Digital’? Who don’t think Digital is a lot of fuss over nothing? No. It’s like trumpeting about the benefits of oxygen – ‘breathe it in! isn’t it great?’ Anyway, if this pixelated screen grab is anything to go by the book looks cool, as you’d expect. Back to top | Permalink | 7 comments28/08/08Gum, a new medium?![]() Step 1. ![]() Step 2. ![]() Step 3. Gradually, all the old squashed gum patches in Muswell Hill are being turned into little pieces of art. ![]() As you’d expect, they’re very small, here’s my son Harrys eleven year old fingers for scale. ![]() There are literally hundreds of them, maybe four hundred in the High Road alone. ![]() You can commission your very own message. ![]() Take this one - announcing the birth of a child. ![]() Some are more self promotional, ![]() some dedicated to their favourite musician, ![]() or a dog. ![]() Here James professes his love to Daisy. The old romantic - chewing gum outside Sainsburys, never fails. ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() It raises a few questions: Who does it? Does he/she work in other areas? Art/graffiti? Will the council scrape them up/vandalise them? How long before they pop up in the ambient section of D&AD for Wrigley’s/Bubblicious? Back to top | Permalink | 2 comments:: Next Page >> |