What Marketers Can Learn From The Art World in 2023.- Why experiences linger longer in the mind.This weekend saw me fill a bag with clothes, jump on a High-Speed and hot-foot it with my loved one towards the capital. All with the aim of immersing myself in the world of art, and to take a little break after the first 3 months of starting my own business. This art tour weekender took in some classics like the Tate Modern, a first trip to the Lightroom to see the immersive David Hockney exhibition, and plenty of street art around the streets of Shoreditch. There's not many places in the world can you find work valued millions of pounds on the street, as well as behind the glass on a gallery wall.
I'M NOT HERE TO TALK ABOUT DATA. But if you want some:
It's pretty clear... The old way of doing things is getting boring. It's been eaten up by TikTok's algorithm, by the online smarts of Gen Z, by the resentment towards larger business in a world where people are struggling to pay for heating. Everything is Art.
Change in ApproachWhat really prompted me to write this blog is this next section... I've wanted to be an artist all my life. I remember going to the Tate and other galleries on school trips. The grandeur of the building, the work being roped off, glassed off. No photography was allowed. No filming was allowed. The rooms were all the same, just with different art. They were almost museum-like, "This is Fine Art", or at least thats what I thought Fast-foward 30 years and gallery experiences are very different. As I said above, you can see some masters of art scene out in public - no gallery needed. Even in my home town of Folkestone, we have permanent works by Tracey Emin, Antony Gormley, Michael Craig Martin and even a Banksy (less externally nowadays). So, creators and galleries stepped it up to keep interest with an ever-growing digital audience by getting less precious over the years, loosening up on those rules and allowing a new way of exploring and mixing with art. Artists now using these spaces to create immersive experiences of art. Art you can actually touch. Closer to how the artist intended one would think. And because of this I can admire what I came to see. Masterful technique, like in the above Roy Lichtenstein painting. (Although admittedly I did trigger the proximity alarm twice on this, the invigilator accused me of playing with the security). But my points remain, the fact I can even show you a photo of it, shows how far it's come. But it isn't just a case of getting a bit more relaxed on the rules, it's about creating a product and experience of visual consumption more in line with audiences and generations today. We expect thing in a certain way now. We expect it to entertain and amaze us, we expect to be able to evidence it and show others, otherwise its average, and no one stood out being average. The main attraction for me over the weekend was the immersive David Hockney exhibition at Lightroom in London below. For 45 minutes you are engulfed in an artist biography, narrated by him, about him, as his work is projected across the walls and the floor. You can sit anywhere, lay down, experience it from which ever angle works for you. It did initially overwhelm the senses, but once positioned it provided the most emotional experience of art I have encountered. It didn't feel real. The colour, the resolution, the animation, the piecing together of over 30 projectors was simply a technical wonder. The application of the technology and how it was used by an artist like David Hockney is what makes this a success. It wasn't a project art exhibition, it was inside the brain of the artist, and I don't think I'll ever forget about it. So, marketers, what the fuck has this got to do with you..? In Conclusion...So if you have got this far you might be saying "Sounds like a great weekend Danny, happy for you, but WTF has this got to do with marketing?" .
Well, if you haven't worked it out by now it's that marketing evolves. Galleries have changed the way they deliver us art, and now maybe it's time to reconsider how we deliver marketing. 15 years ago not many people had a digital strategy and now I would say it makes up the majority of most marketing managers day-to-day. Digital is great in so many ways, but what it does do is put a computer between us an our audiences. A screen. Times are changing. Consumers are more savvy and wary of digital advertising and corporate responsibility. Voices are elevated to millions through platforms like TikTok and Instagram. Movements can be started like that. Just as the art scene realised that it needed to get closer and more in tune with how its audiences wanted to engage with art. My proposal is that we think of new marketing strategies that push that boundary a little more, if not a screen... what else? To create experiences rather than content. To produce things of beauty over ads. To immerse our audiences in our story, over identifying our USP's. Let's get messy. Comments are closed.
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