United Colors of Benetton's "Unhate Foundation"

     This!! This is pretty sweet. Thanks to United Colors of Benetton's new foundation, Unhate, I can now gaze at my favorite world leaders as they make out. Claiming that universal tolerance is one of their "underpinning values," this luxury fashion brand professes that it is on a mission to combat hatred. Before concluding that another group of incredibly wealthy people have come up with a new ploy to make a whole lot of money, check out the images under the "Campaign" section of the Unhate website. Sure, they could be trying to get back on top of the market, but judging by these pictures, UCB is not messing around.

     Let's look at the images themselves. All of the campaign images are essentially close-ups of international leaders locking lips. Additionally, each pair of leaders kissing is currently involved in some sort of foreign conflict with the other leader.
     For example, the first image to appear under "Campaign" on UCB's website is one of United States President Barack Obama hooking up with the Paramount Leader of the People's Republic of China, Hu Jintao. It is no secret that things haven't been so hot between China and the U.S. recently. Not only have tensions been rising between the two leaders, but President Obama has reassured us at least once that he does not fear China's recent developments in advanced weaponry.
     Another image shows Supreme Leader of North Korea Kim Jong-il kissing President of South Korea Lee Myung-bak. Just months ago North and South Korea were firing their share of artillery shells over each other's respective borders. That happened a few months ago though. For UCB to really be pushing the limit, they would have to target an incredibly hostile and volatile conflict. Israeli-Palestinian conflict, anyone?
     This is simply the historical/current events aspect of the campaign. It doesn't analyze the images by themselves as much as it does the people who are in them.

     As I said before, these images are close-ups. There is no avoiding their sense of intimacy and physical closeness as an audience member just due to their size. When these ads have been put up in cities such as Milan, Paris, Tel-Aviv, and New York, they look to be at least/almost ten feet wide and six or seven feet tall. They are put up on projector screens and held by people as banners. UCB refers to this action on their website as "guerilla action."

     This entire campaign reminds me of Gillian Rose's article titled Visual Methodologies in her discussion of sites and modalities. She talks about the three sites at which images are made: sites of image production, the site of the images themselves, and the site of the images seen by various audiences. These are manipulated images of world leaders sharing a subjectively intimate experience for everybody to see. Unfortunately, and sort of ironically, many people in countries such as North Korea and possibly even China may never be able to see these images.
     As far as aesthetics are concerned, I don't think that these images were overly produced to have a "beautiful" appearance. In fact, they are pixelated and, in my opinion, pretty visually unsettling. However, that sends a message from UCB to their audience, to the world.

     I'm not sure how I feel about the campaign morally or ethically speaking, especially because it is likely just a plan to get back in the market for UCB. However, this is bold. In a way this is revolutionary.  Even in "liberal" Western cultures, billboards of men and women kissing is not generally acceptable. Men and men kissing? Forget about it! To think that some of the most significant and relevant leaders of out time, most of who are all males, are kissing on the lips, is such a foreign idea to all of us around the world.

     I think that this time UCB did it right. If world leaders are offended by these images, then it is clear that UCB has everybody's blood boiling - not the West, not the Far East, but the world at large.