Critical Review

 

On the cusp of change

The series, produced in 1972, aired over a backdrop of growing uncertainty – the country had recently decimalised and was about the join the Common Market with all the implications of loss of national Identity being heavily debated in the media and union unrest was on the rise with the miners strike of this year blacking out much of the country. The optimism of the 1960’s was being replaced with a growing sense of cynicism – The Beatles had gone, love wasn’t what we needed and when Lennon had prophetically proclaimed in 1970 that ‘the dream is over’John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band , God, 1970), by 1972 they were beginning to see what he meant.

Episode four, which I am critiquing here, was part of a series in which John Berger tried to explain his beliefs that western cultural aesthetics contained hidden ideologies (Notes on The Gaze, Daniel Chandler, 2000). One of Berger’s central premises was that western art objectifies women as sex objects and for this reason the series is not only seen as a seminal work on post modernism but also an important piece of feminists writing. Jane Caputi in her book ‘The Age of Sex Crimes’ sums up the series by stating that, ‘Berger analyses the traditional depictions of women in European oil painting and the continuation of these conventions into contemporary imagery, especially advertising (Caputi, 1987).  

Looking back at this episode 37 years later it would be all too easy to take the view that all advertising in this era was misogynistic and sexually exploitative, this, however, isn’t the whole picture. Whilst it is true to say that British advertising of this period was still heavily influenced by American Advertising, due in no small part to the fact that most of the main agencies were still American owned and the wave of new British advertising agencies that would define British advertising from the later 70’s onwards were still to come, there was still much advertising that was starting to display the traits that would soon define the British style. Examples of this new emerging Britishness would be the Smash ads (often voted the best campaign in the world), the iconic Martini advertising, Cresta (it’s frothy man!), and even the Andrex puppy made it’s first appearance this year!  

More than one hidden agenda

We have to take into account that Berger had an agenda when he made the series and that his opinion of advertising, or publicity as he continually refers to it, and the industry behind it was coloured by his prejudice’s. Images from adverts showing scantily clad and naked women are continually shown in close up, deliberately obscuring the headlines and copy, and though I wouldn’t defend this kind of exploitative advertising it is hard to form a true opinion when the images are seen out of context. Today sex still sells and underpins much of the advertising produced today for produced from perfumes to chocolate bars. 

This criticism aside it is impossible to disagree with the central premise of this episode, that advertising promotes envy and that this envy was not necessarily a good thing. As a portent of things to come Berger hits the nail squarely on the head. His statement that ‘The purpose of publicity is to make the spectator marginally dissatisfied with his present way of life. Not with the way of life of society, but with his own within it. It suggests that if he buys what it is offering, his life will become better. It offers him an improved alternative to what he is,’ could be seen as at the root of much of the problems that we are currently experiencing. Since this programme aired we have seem society famously pronounced dead to be replaced by ‘economies and markets’ and the individual replaced by the consumer.  Berger could have had no idea when he stated that our desire to have more, ‘may persuade a few people to use a bank credit system’ to finance these desires, would equate to personal debts of over £1,456billion by 2008, (www.creditchoices.co.uk, 2009) 

Berger asserts that when ‘everybody’s place in society is more or less determined by birth personal envy is a less familiar emotion, and without social envy glamour cannot exist’. The belief, rightly or wrongly, that anything was possible, that we were no longer governed by these out-dated social constraints has been the driving force behind western capitalism and the free market over the last 30 years and is now proving to be it’s Achilles heal, because of course not everything is in life is possible and the things we envy and desire  all have a price and eventually the debts have to be paid.

A capitalist conspiracy?

Though he doesn’t state it openly there is an underlying assertion within the programme that in some way advertising is the public face of a general capitalistic philosophy which by implication implies that there is a political motive behind it, and he states that, ‘publicity abuses public figures, and events and struggles in other parts of the world’ and that it uses situations and events to glamorize products whilst detaching these situations from their original meanings; hence we see a revolutionary like Fidel Castro being used to sell beer without having to think about what Castro actually stood for. My feeling is that Berger viewed advertising in the same way that Marx viewed religion, as an opium for the masses, a vehicle to keep society preoccupied with trivial and selfish dreams and desires while horrors occurring in dark corners of the world went unnoticed. Though it would be hard to totally disagree with his position, it is hard not to look back at this era with nostalgia as a time when advertising was actually far less of a political tool than in can be today. Since the late seventies when the Conservative party famously commissioned the fledgling Saatchi and Saatchi agency to produce the advertising for their election campaign, the advertising agency has often been used as a political tool with some ad men such as Tim Bell actually crossing the line to take up careers as political advisers and spin doctors. Today the advertising industry is seen as being as much a part of our political system as our daily newspapers with certain agency’s reputations being built as much by their political affiliations as by their commercial work.

A one sided argument 

As a piece of academic criticism ‘Ways of Seeing’ is rightly seen as an important work. As a way of discussing how we view images and the meaning of imagery it is a great introduction the some of Walter Benjamin’s philosophical concepts of Aura and The Gaze, however as a study of the state of British advertising in 1972 it is far too one sided to give us a true picture. There are no interviews or comments from anyone within the advertising industry to juxtapose Berger’s opinions and there is no attempt to debate his opinions. Ways of Seeing is basically one mans way of seeing, a very articulate, intelligent and persuasive man, but still just one mans opinion.

I’ve spent most of my career working in and around the advertising industry and though I can accept that some aspects and practices of the industry can be seen as questionable, for the most part it just reflects the needs of 21st century society. It is the modern equivalent of the village market stall, allowing manufacturers and suppliers to display their goods in their best light to potential customers, the equivalent of the old market hawker, where the loudest and most entertaining hawker invariably got the most customers. The advertising industry is a mirror on our society and often doesn’t show us in our best light, but it also helps charities raise millions in donations and allows these charities, mostly for free, to highlight the plight of millions of people in need around the world.  

 

The 5 least effective ads

As I have already stated many of the ads featured in this programme are there to illustrate the worst aspects of advertising as seen by Berger in 1972 so there is no real shortage of poor ads, however, it is all to easy to criticise many of these ads as being kitsch or clichéd, however, we have to take into account that they were obviously relatively effective or else they wouldn’t have been run. The ads that I feel don’t work from today’s perceptive are as follows and have been chosen as much on moral as on aesthetic grounds:

1.Owens Cars (Cars from Owens are part of a way of life)

Though I can’t see who the actual company is, whether it a Rolls Royce dealership or a hire firm, this kind of class based aspirational advertising is totally inappropriate for today’s market. Rolls Royce’s are sold on performance and craftsmanship or in David Ogilvy’s case the ticking of the clock, rather than as the aristocracies favourite mode of transport. We aspire to own a ‘Roller’ as a sign of our success not our breading. (fig 1)

2. Standard Life (The Future is golden with a Standard Life nest egg)

The advertising of pensions, savings and retirement plans has become much more regulated since the early seventies and the use of golden eggs and absolute phrases like ‘the future is golden’ just aren’t acceptable, because as we know the future isn’t all that golden! There is also no small print about the risked etc which wouldn’t have been required then. I feel with hindsight the false selling of financial security as a guaranteed result of purchasing a financial product is an area that the advertising industry cannot be proud of. (fig 2)

3. Barclaycard (Already 1 man in 21 has a different kind of spending power)

An amazing piece of social history when less than 5% of men had a credit card, but as a contributing factor to the position we find ourselves in today I wonder if even the hard nosed ad men of 1972 would have shied away from this kind of advertising, then again probably not!

4. Embassy Regal

As someone who smoked for over 20 years I don’t honestly feel that advertising had any real influence on my habit, but it is a bad habit, it can kill you and as such I feel we are right to not promote it.

5. Hillman Avenger

Surely even in 1972 the Hillman Avenger wasn’t seen as being so beautiful that a picture and it’s name was enough to sell it to the great British public. A truly awful ad by any standard! (fig 3)

 

My 5 favourite ads.

As I have said it’s hard to judge these ads through today’s jaundiced eyes but these are my five favourites.

1. The Martini Ad (The right one, the dry one)

Part of the iconic martini campaign of the early seventies ‘Any time, any place, any where’.
A great example of brand building and brand positioning.

2. Coca Cola (The real thing)

One of the greatest taglines in history, enough said.

3. Parker Pens (for the serious doodler)

Great line, great brand association (Michelangelo cartoons), great execution. An ad that could run unchanged today and not look out of place. (fig 4)

4. Double Diamond (I’m only here for the beer)

A fantastic line that with very little work would work today. The forerunner (and probable inspiration) behind the Castlemaine XXXX campaign of the 90’s. (fig 5)  

5. Scholl (The real thing)

A fantastic example of a well written information based ad that you don’t see that often today. An example of a great product meeting a great copywriter, ala the Volkswagon Beetle campaign from DDB in the 60’s and 70’s.

Reworked Ad.

My reworked ad is admittedly tongue in cheek, but since we wouldn’t be advertising cigarettes today and knowing what I know now if I was asked to produce an ad for Embassy Regal (my original cigarette of choice) this is the ad I’d now produce.

 

Bibliography.

Daniel Chandler. (2000). Notes on The Gaze.
Online. Available:http://www.aber.ac.uk/media/Documents/gaze/gaze08.html
[14th January 2009]

Jane Caputi,. (1987). The Age of Sex Crimes.
Online.Available:http://books.google.com/booksid=6naKaWROJ0gC&pg=PA173&lpg=
PA173&dq=Ways+of+seeing+women+sex+objects&source=web&ots=6KjCdOTCO5&sig=xkobA4TJ6u4H2D7
BXKi8Irww4Lw&hl=en&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=2&ct=result
[14th January 2009]

Seamour Rathore (2009). Personal debt increased by £1million every 10 minutes in 2008.
Online.Available:http://www.creditchoices.co.uk/personal-debt-up-by-1-million-pounds-every-10-mins-in-2008-05-01-09.html
[14th January 2009]