If you ever thought Vegas was just about gambling, you’d be wrong. I recently spent a holiday weekend there and ended up attending some really stimulating exhibitions, including the Art of the Motorcycle (with a showcase of 150 motorcycles from 100 years ago to present date), the Guggenheim museum and an Alexander Calder exhibition at the Bellagio Hotel.
It was my introduction to Calder that got my Jaffe Juices flowing, especially when noticing a rather interesting parallel between his philosophy and revolutionary approach to art, and our world of online advertising.
Alexander Calder made his mark in the early part of the 20th century. Hailing from a family of artists, he began creating toys at an early age. With a degree in mechanical engineering, he decided to pursue a career as an artist, and would draw upon this knowledge to forever change both abstract and contemporary art.
In short, Calder looked at conventional art as static and one-dimensional. He sought to transform painting into not only three dimensional, but also a multi-media experience, by adding motion and even sound.
He was an artist of great originality who defined volume without mass and incorporated movement and time in art. His inventions redefined certain basic principles of sculpture and have established him as one of the most innovative sculptors of the Twentieth Century.
His later objects were huge sculptures of arching lines and graceful abstract shapes that now inhabit public plazas worldwide.
It was Calder’s disruption of existing conventions that defined a new way to approach artistic creation. His work became a precedent-setting defining moment in the timeline of artistic evolution and innovation.
The Art of Advertising
Our industry is not that different. The similarities between painting and sculpture, and online advertising are stark and profound in many ways. (Apologies to any purists who might be put out by the comparison.)
First, there’s the common usage of the term, art. While the current state of a direct-response infested industry skews decidedly towards science, I firmly contend that our business is all about art; the ability to entice and engage our audience into a self-confessed submission, through the process of entertaining or informing in a story-like manner.
Creativity thrives as an art form; it flounders, when reduced to an equation or formula.
Second, there’s the idea of innovation in an otherwise conventional playing arena. This continues from where the earlier thought left off – if allowed to roam free, to explore and to experiment, it opens the door to countless possibilities. Intertwined with imagination, creativity runs rampant on a canvas that is blank on the surface, yet is teaming with complexity, depth and boundless paths to discover.
If nothing else, innovation is the one ingredient that comes shrink-wrapped in a world governed by technology and a rule book which is yet to be written. While I’ve seen the magazine page imprinted on transparent, holographic or mirrored paper, this remains the exception rather than the norm in this conventional world. Our charge is simply to invent as we go along; break the existing rules and make new ones.
Third, (and the primary reason in linking the two worlds), is the idea of bringing a static approach to life.
While innovation might be the ingredient or catalyst that sets us apart from our technology-challenged counterparts, interactivity is the sole differentiator that positions us in a league of our own.
Calder brought art to life by reaching out to our five senses. Online advertising attempts to do the same by injecting the ability to respond and interact, thereby transforming the push-based monologue into a pull-based dialogue.
Calder offered an entirely new perspective on the way art is created, interpreted and absorbed. Based on viewing angle, breeze in the air, or lighting, an entirely unique outcome would be arrived at by each and every viewer. Let’s call this personalization for the sake of extending this analogy.
And although art as we know it today still exists largely as a one-dimensional canvas format (read: traditional advertising), Calder’s approach changed how art was looked at forever, as well as the way contemporary artists express themselves. This approach is also evident in literature and philosophy.
Online is Bringing Advertising Back to Life
One of the primary arguments leveled against the Internet by the TV-loving faithfuls is that the online experience is limited, relative to the emotion-bursting richer television offering. Audio? Check. Visual/Graphics? Check. Animation/Movement? Check. Interactivity? If we’re talking about hitting the remote, then Check. If not, then me thinks this is rather a function of the quality of creative talent onboard, intertwined with creative unit size, and dashed with speckles of bandwidth limitations.
If we lose the ability to deploy interactive as the active ingredient, we put ourselves in a tough position to ultimately sustain any point of competitive and differentiated advantage.
This is my main concern about bringing TV to the Web. Pure TV on the Web is the type of convergence we want to avoid. To paraphrase Dick Hopple from last week’s Jaffe Juice, we have yet to (and need to) apply a new set of rules to the way we evolve TV-like advertising in the interactive space. We should be reminded and encouraged by the first TV ads, which were radio-like by nature.
Online has not only been able to bring traditional advertising to life, but indeed is proving to be able to bring it back to life. In a new world, dominated by skeptical, empowered consumers and retreating, defensive marketers, it is online that is proving to be the spark required to re-ignite the flames of creativity.
I love the notion that online is not the reinvention of the wheel, but simply a repurposing of it. This lesson was learnt from one Alexander Calder. So the next time, you’re trying to sell through the online imperative, consider a visit to your nearest museum (or if you’re lucky, a Calder exhibition) for the necessary inspiration.