Brandalism

Great term, coined by graffiti artist Banksy, and expounded on in his book Wall and Piece (see post below):

"People abuse you everyday. They butt into your life, take a cheap shot at you and then disappear. They leer at you from tall buildings and make you feel small. They make flippant comments from buses that imply you're not sexy enough and the fun is happening somewhere else. They are on TV making your girlfriend feel inadequate. They have access to the most sophisticated technology the world has ever seen and they bully you with it. They are The Advertisers and they are laughing at you.

"You, however, are forbidden to touch them. Trademarks, intellectual property rights and copyright law mean advertisers can say what they like wherever they like with total impunity.

"Screw that. Any advert in public space that gives you no choice whether you see it or not is yours. It's yours to take, re-arrange and re-use. You can do whatever you like with it. Asking for permission is like asking to keep a rock someone just threw at your head.

"You owe the companies nothing. You especially don't owe them any courtesy. They have rearranged the world to put themselves in front of you. They never asked for your permission, don't even start asking for theirs."

An extreme point of view naturally. But as with all extreme views, it includes more than a few grains of truth. How much of what we do is just corporate sponsored vandalism and psychological terrorism? And how much does what we are always saying it's meant to do - improve a client's business performance by rewarding its audience and building the positive, engaging brand relationship that results in (mutually beneficial) increased sales.

It is a worry I think. Yes, advertising is a commercial venture, which doesn't bother me in the slightest (otherwise I would be an angry artist writing polemic books). But whilst selling stuff, surely it is our job to ensure that the work we produce is something more than one step up the ladder from vandalism and terrorism.

Or not. Maybe I'm just kidding myself.

Legal, decent, honest and true, or so it goes. But as with most things in our world today, we stretch 'legal' to within an inch of its life, often making the whole concept of 'decent, honest and true' rather redundant, sadly.