Art and Advertising
Advertising is the greatest art form of the 20th century. –Marshall McLuhan
I love quoting McLuhan. Almost everything he said has a way of making me feel both content and uneasy simultaneously. I was once an artist. Not just an artist, but a conceptual artist. Which is to say I worked very hard to make things look like they weren’t designed (which actually requires quite a bit of design). The reason I think McLuhan is right about advertising (great works of art like South Park and Andy Kauffman’s whole carear not withstanding) is that advertising is honest. I know, never thought you’d see those words written huh? Thing is everyone knows what the goal of advertising is. With art its a little unclear.
The primary purpose of an ad is to, well, advertise. This purpose is clear and upfront. Any entertainment, message or otherwise deeper meaning beyond this primary purpose is simply there to make that ad better at its job (or sometimes just snuck in to win advertising awards).
The true goal of art is actually the same as advertising, but it’s hidden under a veneer of other meanings. Art, in the end, has the primary purpose of promoting its creator, just like advertising. This is not to say that artists are just out there making self promotional material (or is it?). Art is a wonderful thing and adds a lot of value to the world. A piece of art actually has a much more difficult job to do than and ad. The entertainment, message or otherwise deeper meaning in a piece of art is not just there to serve the primary goal, but is actually there to BE the art.
Although we do create ads to fit within campaigns, and ad needs to be able to function in a vacuum. Everything the ad has to convey needs to be contained in that ad. Contrary to this, art needs to exist within the context of art. Take a Jackson Pollock out of the art context and its just a bunch of spilled paint, but seen in its place, it changes the way the worth thinks about what makes an image. Art relies on this context. This is what causes reactions like, “My kid could paint that.” Advertising can’t rely on the history of advertising to support it. Not knowing who David Ogilvy is, won’t stop someone from knowing the answer to “Where’s the beef?”
Other Side of the Isle
So I guess they got sick of me complaining about how much better the creative work I keep being asked to make could be. I am being moved over to the creative team in the new role of Creative Experience Lead. It is going to mean little to no hands on coding for me, but I’ll be involved in each and every project from strategy through to completion. It represents a big change for Kastner as well. The old copywriter/art director model is changing fast.
Red Bull
I just took a job at Kastner & Partners, the AOR for Red Bull. I am pretty excited about it. The job looks great and Red Bull seems like they are going to be a great client.
New Radio Player
Just finished rebuilding the front-end of the player for radio.com. I’ve been working in parallel with the existing team stripping everything down to the essentials and rebuilding in Flash (from Flex) while they have been adding new features. We finally got all their new code integrated to my streamlined version. We haven’t run benchmarks on it yet, but it already looks a lot crisper and runs way smoother. This player is really hi-tech, so I am glad I got to do this right off the bat. I am now a lot more familiar with the whole project than I would have been if I was just picking off projects piece-by-piece. I’ve still never met anyone who has been able to convince me that Flex is an advantage at all. I find it bloated and cumbersome and would always rather just build a pure AS3 project.
Sold Out
Yeah, it happened. I sold out. CBS Radio came along and offered me a chance to basically rebuild the player for radio.com, so I am saying goodbye to 2HELIX DESIGN. I am looking forward to the chance to work for someone else for a while. I’ll be a Senior Software Engineer over there and will be able to get my hands really dirty. It looks like they have a great team already, so I am excited to get to work with them.
Don’t worry everyone. Blanka is still going to be running 2HELIX. She did all the hard work anyway.
New Website!
Ok, we’ve been in business a while now, so its about time. 2HELIX is proud to launch a new website!
Check it out, it has a lot of detail about some of our projects as well as images of all the work we’ve done over the years.
Produce The Doctors
Today we launched a new website for The Doctors! On The Produce The Doctors site, users can submit their own ideas for the producers to review. Some ideas will get picked and actually made into segments on the television show. It gives the produces the ability to really get to know what people want to see on the show. Its a really great fusion of the show’s website and TV content.
Check the site out here!
Mojo House
We just launched Mojo’s new website! Mojo envisioned for themselves a site that felt clean and calm to highlight their incredible portfolio. Using their design as a base, we built a site with smooth transitions and animations that shows off their work without getting in the way. They have an amazing portfolio. If you want to see it, click here.
[UPDATE: We also built a really cool viewing site for them to use to post work for their clients. The whole thing is just based on naming conventions and FTP. ]
Changents Widget
Along with the other work we’ve been doing for Changents, we produced a widget (well actually six widgets) to go along with their Timberland Earthkeepers campaign. Each of the designated Earthkeepers Heroes got a unique widget to help promote their cause. The widget is distributed using the Gigya network. They are also part of a contest. At the end of the designated time, whichever Earthkeepers Hero has the most widgets installed will win a publicity stunt spot on TV paid for by Timberland. Neat huh!
I embedded them all here (don’t want to show any favoritism!):
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Facebook game launch
We lust launched a new Facebook game today! Its a trivia based games with a theme of changing the world for the better. Timberland and Changents teamed up to bring to life a Facebook game to promote their new “Earthkeepers” brand. The game was to promote both environmental awareness as well as the particular Earthkeeper Heroes selected. All you need to complete the game is a few friends and some greenie knowledge.
[UPDATE: THE GAME IS NO LONGER AVAILABLE, BUT HERE ARE SOME SCREENSHOTS]
The Earthkeepers Hero home page
One of the many Earthkeepers Hero question pages
Another Earthkeepers Hero Question page
The Eathkeepers Hero skills selection page
If you want to see more about this project we’ve added it to our featured section. Click here to go there, or just play the game!