Marketing

In Rotterdam, CBK Rotterdam (Centrum Beeldende Kunst) recently received this city's Marketing Award, an award given annually to "individuals or organizations that use the city [...] as a breeding ground for pioneering and contributing innovative solutions to social issues. And [...] to the image and promotion of Rotterdam at home and abroad as a resilient and future-proof city." The visual arts organization received the award in particular for placing the sculpture Moments Contained by British artist Thomas J. Price right in front of Rotterdam Central Station.

It is good that in this way visual art gets positive attention and thus becomes known to a large audience. But visual art as marketing; what about that? There seems to be something wrong with that combination. What do I actually think about that, I wondered, but didn't find out.

But visual art as marketing; what about that?

The use of visual art as a marketing tool may seem new, but after some inquiries, this turned out not to be the case at all. Consider, for example, the many sculptures and mosaics of the ancient Greeks and Romans. During excavations in Pompeii, mosaic advertisements dating back some two thousand years were found; they proved to be a successful marketing tool even then. In earlier times - and sometimes still today - sculptures in public spaces not infrequently referred to power and prestige, or at least they were intended to underscore and enhance it. The leader marketed himself and his power and used art in the public space of the city to do so.

There have always been plenty of reasons to use visual art for marketing a regime, a city or a product. It could (and can) be about identity and image, political propaganda, shedding community involvement, tourism or economics. You name it. Using visual art as a marketing tool in cities and politics is a multifaceted phenomenon that goes beyond mere aesthetic considerations, while artists and art lovers prefer to view art from that very aesthetic perspective.

By the way, the prize was not only awarded because of Moments Contained, the jury was also concerned with the entire international sculpture collection in Rotterdam, which includes over sixty sculptures by artists such as Paul McCarthy, Naum Gabo, Ossip Zadkine, and Henry Moore (sculptureinternationalrotterdam.nl).

So it's all very normal. And yet I'm not quite there yet

It is clear that marketing is gaining more and more importance in more and more areas, and that it is also becoming more "normal" to engage in it. Millions of people alone 'market' themselves daily via Instagram, TikTok or Tinder, to name a few. So if people are already 'marketing' themselves so enthusiastically, why not the visual arts?

In this BK information, by the way, you will find a small example of a combination of these: see the article 'Creating opportunities through LinkedIn'.

So it's all very normal. And yet I'm not quite there yet.