OUGD401 Context Of Practice - Studio Brief 1 - Task 4

Volkswagen BlueMotion advertisements inspired by Dali and Magritte

The two advertisements were created by DDB, an international renowned advertising agency that have created advertisements for McDonalds, Harvey Nichols and MINI COOPER. The company base their ideas upon ‘fresh thinking’ and use a range of media to create audience ‘hits’, these include installations, posters and videos.

The two advertisements are both promoting Volkswagen’s new car; the ‘Polo Bluemotion’. A car designed to use a considerate amount less petrol than the usual car, hence the strap line ‘Absurdly low consumption’. Both images are painted and sample techniques and signature surrealist traits from two artists, Salvador Dali and Rene Magritte.

The first I am going to look at is the desert scene showing a warped fuel gauge and a crying petrol assistant. The image has several depictions within;

The crying man looking at the empty fuel gauge with several empty pockets, obviously upset with the amount of petrol while the empty pockets could exaggerate the little money the man may have.

The several oil rigs which have been converted to now hold flowers ( a natural contradiction to oil) , there appears to be 3 derelict and a single working rig left, this could signify the car is 3x more efficient.

The ant carrying a petrol can, these insects are renowned for being able to carry up to 10x their own body weight, I believe this depiction is trying to exaggerate the little amount of petrol needed.

·       The petrol station symbol cloud, the use of a cloud represents eco-friendliness while the fading of the cloud to left could show how the car could reduce your number of visits to a station.

·       The petrol tanker inspired by Salvador Dali’s ‘persistence of memory’, in the image, Dali created an image of a face being help up by several sticks similar to the petrol tanker here, the idea behind the image is to convey the fogginess of a dreaming state, hard to put into context for a car advertisement however I have an idea that possibly, the whole is image is a depiction of a dream of a driver and the ‘absurdly low consumption’ is too good to be true, placing the product in a positive light.

·       The petrol gauge similar to that seen in every car is hung from a tree and constricted around the middle by a belt, the gauge shows a full petrol tank and the belt symbolises how the car will need less petrol. Yet again the image is similar to Salvador Dali’s melting clocks seen in ‘persistence of memory’

An idea only realised after looking at each little image; the several items within the image work together, the tears being cried from the man are bringing life to desert ( the flowers on the oil rigs) and evaporating into the clouds (petrol pump cloud in the sky). The second image shows a balcony setting overlooking a sea, similar to the first image, the painting can be broken down into several little images which are have some relevance:Starting from left to right. 

The first thing we can see is the figure of a man holding a petrol pump while his head is missing and replaced by an hourglass. The image is of the headless man is very similar to that of ‘The pilgrim’ by Rene Magritte, a surrealist painter just as Dali was. Rene created the piece ‘ The pilgrim’ inspired by a French book ‘The fantomas’; a story about a surreal serial killer and also a master of disguise. I think the relevance to the crime fiction is irrelevant and the image used within the advertisement is intended to show a driver of the car will spend less time filling up the car (hourglass). This idea can also be proved by the spider creating a web from the petrol pump, signifying the pump has not been used as the spider would not have been there.

·       The second is an idea I enjoy, set out upon the balcony is a game of chess, the chess pieces are split into two teams; the environment (trees) and Petrol/oil (oil drums, petrol cans, pump and an oil rig). It’s easy to see that the environment has more pieces upon the board, therefore winning; this promotes the environmental benefits of the Polo BlueMotion.

Directly above the chessboard appears a wine bottle resting upon a holder, the bottle does seem to float at first glance however at a closer inspection we can see the wine bottles holder in sitting upon the surface of the sea, a surrealist idea signature to Magritte’s work. Within the bottle sits an oil tanker on a bed of water surrounded by a dark fog which is contained in the corked bottle. Placing into context this is similar to a series of bottles Rene created in 1959 however the idea behind this series is unknown, I believe it is used within this advert to show how the car will reduce emissions ( dark fog within bottle is stopped from entering the contrasting clean blue horizon ).

·       The fourth and final aspect within the advert is the canvas and easel to the right of the image.  Similar to Magritte’s ‘The Human Condition’, a canvas is held in front of a landscape while the painting on the canvas is identical to landscape, a complex surrealist idea. I believe the image here has been used to portray the car as eco - friendly and similar to Magritte’s idea of ‘not what you expect.’ 

The two surrealist styles are similar and share a range of interesting, complex ideas, as an artist I enjoy these advertisements however to a an average member of the public these adverts may be misread or even not understood, form over function would be rather fitting I do believe. Personally even though I enjoy the two adverts and appreciate them as art, the idea behind the iconic pieces by both Magritte and Dali have been spoiled and poorly re-produced, not in terms of technique but of idea and concept.