Andrew Schroeder

I am a simple person and I hope my each of my little posts from the edge of simplicity reflect this.

My experiences of the city are taken in mostly while walking to and from work each morning and afternoon. At 5:30 AM, the city of Minneapolis is absolutely silent. Only crazy people like me who work nonsensical hours are out and about, plugging our way through a city that looks like it has survived a zombie attack. Because I do this meditation twice daily, minute details of the cityscape creep into my consciousness. If the world around me is too hectic, or if I have just finished up a long day at the office, I can walk home… look at my feet and just… come into focus.

This week however, I have been introduced to an obnoxious intrusion into my bit of mental space. Apparently, Boost! Mobile has started to use the sidewalks of my neighborhood as advertising spaces. Large black squares with orange type and images of cell phones have been stuck to the sidewalks.

Is it possible that the only bit of reprieve from advertisements has been sold off? Is this legal? I am curious if the city has actually sold rights for the space of the sidewalk… and if Boost is just one of many advertisers that will be claiming the very ground I walk on as space to sell me something.

After a long weekend of phlegm, I’m back in action. I was riding in my buddy Mike’s car on an errand at work and the topic of cool new ads and the Walker’s hosting of the British Advertising Awards came up.

What does it mean when the most interesting parts of a society’s visual culture are advertisements? I’m asking this in lieu of both the Brit’s advertising foray’s and also the Adicolor series from Adidas. For the most part, there seems to be a distinct lack of products (aside from the following VW commercial) -but- these ads seem to go beyond the touchy-feely, emotional adverts of the 90s.

Lets take for example the Cabury advert of a Gorilla playing the drum sequence in the Phil Collins’ song “In the Air Tonight”.  The advertisment has nothing to do with the crappy chocolate from Cadbury… but… I can’t stop watching the ad.  Taken a step further… apparently the studio that owns the rights to the song has prevented it from being included in versions of the ad posted to You Tube.  So, the gorilla ad runs… without Phil Collins.

The result is something akin to a piece of video art you could find in any white cube gallery.  (Embedding has been disabled… you’ll have to… click)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P1hfNNcOrfY

*****

A different side of the coin: What happens when a social fabric (in this case a city) decides to openly reject advertisements? The city of Sao Paulo, Brazil decided last year to ban outdoor advertisements.  Photographer Tony de Marco has been documenting the city’s empty billboard structures…

From Tony de Marco's FLICKR

My next question: If visual advertisements are banned – how have the advertisers retaliated? Is all advertising product placement? Word of mouth? Do people “randomly” break into the Coke jingle in order to sell soda?