Art. Craft. Design.

The campaign 'Feel Something New' by the Royal Opera House

In this week's class one of our lecturers, Tim Martin, elaborated on the connection between art, craft and design during his class. He pointed out that art aims at expressing the artist’s personality and point of view, craft is the ability to master materials and shapes to provide perfect means and design is rather a managerial, strategic process aiming at providing the highest functionality for a user. According to him, the professions of art and craft provided the basis for the later development of the design field. And there is an area that uses the abilities from all three specialisations. His statement triggered my interest and I tried to find an example in which I could see the described combination – and I found one: In London's underground!

Poster of the Campaign 'Feel Something New' (Atopic London, 2018a)

The amazing advertisement campaign 'Feel Something New' by the Royal Opera House caught my attention immediately. Not only because I am a passionate dancer and they depict dancing people, but because of the whole atmosphere they create with the pictures, the choice of colours standing out from the black background and suitable quotes creating a whole composition as well as the stunning ability of capturing movement. For me, this incorporates all three disciplines: A craftsman has mastered the photography. It was Giles Revell using a 'radical new technique' (Atomic London, 2018a), which he obviously does not reveal. With an artistic eye the photos of the dancers have been arranged on the six different posters and matching colours of the quotes have been chosen. And finally, there is the conceptional design of the whole concept of six different posters and quotes attracting attention. The consultancy Atomic London, dedicated to on all kinds of advertising, design and strategy projects (Atopic London, 2018b), supported this campaign, stating their aim was to 'revamp' the visual identity of the Royal Opera House (Atomic London, 2018a). What is the target group of this campaign?

My first thought when I saw the pictures was that they probably belong to a young, modern ensemble. I was quite astonished when I read they advertised the Royal Opera House because I imagined an opera house to be rather classical, rather conservative, not as vibrant as the posters transmit. So, I conclude the main idea of the revamping campaign is to attract a wide, also young customer group, which has maybe never thought of going to a classical opera house. Also, this 'new […] visual identity' (Atomic London, 2018a) differentiates the theatre and catches the attention of people passing. Within the crowd of overloaded, colourful ads, its artistic look is quite unique.

Poster of the Campaign 'Feel Something New' (Atopic London, 2018a)

In addition to the posters there is even a video capturing the movements in the campaign:

Video to the Campaign 'Feel Something New' (Royal Opera House, 2018)

From my point of view, this perfect combination of the abilities of designers, artists and craftsmen creates a unique and powerful campaign.

Reference List:

Atomic London (2018a) Royal Opera House: Feel Something New, Available at: http://atomic-london.co.uk/portfolio/feel-something-new/ (Accessed: 17.10.2018).

Atomic London (2018b) Hello, Available at: http://atomic-london.co.uk/about/ (Accessed: 17.10.2018).

Royal Opera House (2018) Royal Opera House - Feel Something New (Gianni Schicchi). Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5LhaAEw9st0 (Accessed: 17.10.2018).