“She’ll have one of those lovely wines.”
A cultural catalogue * Contact: friends of dick whitman at gmail dot com
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INSIDE
BOOK CONTRIBUTORS
Alex Balk, Smoker
Carol Diehl, Art Critic
Matthew Gallaway , Novelist
Megan Lubaszka, Architect
Angela Serratore, Historian
Tim Siedell, Ad Man
Natasha Simons, Writer
Christina Perry & Derrick Gee, Designers
Dave Wilkie, Ad Man
PALS
October 26, 2009
September 22, 2009
Illustrator Bernie Fuchs, who’s work I only recently came to know about and adore, has died.
Here’s a snippet from The Awl piece where we talked about Bernie:
Illustrator Murray Tinkelman, who also worked at Cooper’s Studio, gave an interview about the first time he saw Fuchs work: “It was gorgeous” he said. He conferred with the other two superstars of Cooper Studios, Joe Bowler and Coby Whitmore. Bowler and Whitmore arrived together to inspect the new painting. Whitmore was “speechless,” Bowler said: “I don’t know who the hell did this, but the business is never going to be the same.”
And here is the NYT obit.
September 15, 2009
Lookie, lookie. Here’s a Johnny Walker Red ad in a 1963 copy of Ebony.
Have you ever had Johnny Walker Red? As far as scotch goes, Red is the well drink of the Walker label; the lower end whiskey. So it further reinforces the class chasm between the Don and his rough and tumble prison guard pal.
Speaking of chasms: let’s talk about Ebony! The TV hacks had obvious reasons to be alarmed by Pete’s suggestion to run ads in black magazines like Ebony or Jet. Both those mags only ran ads with black models and given that the only blacks the men on Madison avenue see are pressing their elevator buttons and offering them towels, the idea of black consumers does not connote ‘modern luxury’.
The ancient notions about race is perverse of course, but I think the real catch here is what potential advertising could and will have towards integration. Not in some do-gooder sense but in that money is all the same color. So if it puts more of that color in the silk suit pockets of some liquor executives, why not take out an ad in Ebony?
(the original post had a 1973 ad by accident. The ad you see above is from Ebony 1963)
September 1, 2009
Paul’s bad trip about annihilation at the hands of the Cubans during Creative’s cannibis break was well rooted in the Bacardi’s reputation. The Bacardi family mixed business, weapons, guerillas, and politics to build a liquor empire.
From a 2008 Washington Post article called Rum and Revolution:
Bacardi family members supported the Cuban revolutionaries, including Fidel Castro and the broader M-26-7 organization. It is unlikely that Castro’s revolution would have succeeded without the wide middle-class support that it enjoyed, a reaction against the brutal repression of the Batista regime and its thugs…Other Bacardi family members, employees and facilities were also put at the service of the underground.
The Bacardi company welcomed the revolution publicly with ads and parties, but Bosch grew wary of the Castro regime as its pro-Soviet Che Guevara wing became dominant and Castro’s dictatorial tendencies became clear.
The ad above is from 1956, before the Sterling Cooper treatment. Nevertheless, that mustache makes that guy look like a total Stalinist.
August 24, 2009
Bernie Fuchs. This is a name to know. He was considered the master ad illustrator of the late 1950’s. He set the template for what men over at Sterling Cooper were going to do with with their copy art and then eventually with photographs: capture the inherent drama. Here’s a whole gallery. Pretty lush.
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