Author: Mariana Grezova

This week, we’d like to introduce a few artists we think would make fantastic art fusion collaborators. What are the qualifications, you ask? Dynamism, a talent for combining the seemingly incompatible conceptual, textural and material forms, and above all, a uniqueness of vision that has the ability to draw viewers in.

Kate Gibb is a well-established British silkscreen artist. An obsessive printmaker and illustrator, she is best known for the artwork she creates for Chemical Brothers album covers, and non-commercially for her graphic and arresting hand-screened single editions. Juxtaposing cultural, social and visual boundaries – between traditional and innovative, static and dynamic, Kate’s work is both bold and mesmerizing. Involving her in a strategically managed collaboration, Gibb could bring a colourful, yet unpretentious voice to a well-established and traditional brand. The energy and approachability of her work has the potential of connecting with younger and fashion conscious audiences, we feel.

Karel Martens, an internationally renowned Dutch graphic designer and visual artist, has become known over many years for his structural, yet playful and super-colourful visual language. Experimenting with found industrial artifacts, Martens has developed a visual expression that’s capable of penetrating with an extreme force through any medium, be it kinetic sculptures, relief prints or paperwork.

Martens could bring to a brand not only a sense of tactile innovation, but a sense of nostalgia for objects that are disappearing from our daily lives faster than we’d like. Who wouldn’t like to see the objects we take for granted redefined and seen from a brand new perspective?

We will be putting interesting artists in the spotlight on a regular basis so keep an eye out for future posts.

There are two distinct ways to approach an art fusion collaboration. If you are a Brand considering collaborating with an Artist, you will either choose the Deconstruction process or the Integration process, depending on your needs and goals. What the heck are those, you ask? And what’s the difference? Well, let us explain.

If your Brand is in need of consumer attention where a halo of integrity, innovation and creativity is desirable, deconstruction may be the route to take. What will the process be like? Well, frankly, an interrogation – a painfully revealing, yet an endlessly rewarding experience. The main objective is to courageously question the assumptions behind the traditional and the established, whether of a product, a service or an event. In other words, the initial phase of deconstruction needs to break down as many existing forms and patterns as possible. It needs to expose and eliminate a countless amount of invisible barriers that eventually will allow for a new space from where the unfamiliar and unexpected can rise and be recognized and ultimately interpreted.

An effective example of art fusion-by-deconstruction was a collaboration between Lacoste x Campana Brothers in 2009. The acclaimed furniture designers from Brazil deconstructed the iconic Lacoste polo shirt by using modified Lacoste logos to create everything from chairs to polo shirts that verged on social commentary. The effort managed to deconstruct the notion of the iconic Lacoste polo shirt, and create talk-value through inventiveness and a sense of humour.

Most of the collaborations we see today however, are based on art fusion-by-integration. The most successful ones are a juxtaposition of sorts that unites differences in a surprising, yet pleasing way. In other words, using integration doesn’t need to dig deep as deconstruction does, but rather cast as wide a net as possible in order to find two distinctive opposites that can be brought together in a most extraordinarily way. Is your Brand considered traditional? Perhaps a collaboration with an innovative, modern Artist would be just the ticket.

A good example of this is Herman Miller x House Industries – while Herman Miller isn’t exactly considered ‘traditional’, its collaboration with House Industries brought a currency and a sense of ‘newness’ to its classic modern pieces.

So, if art fusion-by-deconstruction is about finding and bringing out the Art in a Brand, art fusion-by-integration is about joining an Artist and Brand to create something that represents both. Of course, some of the best examples of art fusion has integrated both forms to create a show stopping combination of branded Art coupled with incredibly desirable products. Louis Vuitton has shown the way in their collaborations with Takashi Murakami and Yayoi Kusama.

At ARTS & LABOUR, we are naturally very interested in contemporary Artists and follow the work of many very closely. In our next post, we’d like to introduce you to a few who we think would make fantastic art fusion collaborators with the right Brand. Stay tuned.

Even though there are examples of art fusion collaborations as far back as the early 1930’s, they’re still considered unchartered territory by many Brands and Marketers today. With their popularity growing immensely, we surprisingly still haven’t developed a language that allows us to talk about art fusion collaborations in greater detail.

When talking about an automobile, for example, other than talking about its manufacturer, we differentiate a car model on so many levels. Does it have a manual or an automatic transmission? Is it a sedan or a coupé or a station wagon? Was it made in Germany, Mexico or Taiwan? And so forth. Similar aspects apply to other products, like a bicycle – we distinguish between racing bikes, a hybrid or mountain bike, between its gears and speeds, its material and weight, and so forth.

When talking about art fusion, our vocabulary is rather limited. An art fusion collaboration is either successful or not, and therefore either talked about or not. However just like a car, it can also be examined on so many other levels, other than just being recognized for its Brand and its Designers or Artists, be it a handbag or a pair of jeans or a coffee table. Technically, an art fusion collaboration is a result of working with one of two key methodologies, Deconstruction or Integration. The ingredients may be the same for each, however the results are not.

Take Levi’s jeans, a Brand that has presented fashion and design enthusiasts around the world with several successful art fusion collaborations. Let’s compare two: each used identical elements – blue jeans and creativity – yet each offered a totally different aesthetic and emotional effect.

One, called Persona, was created in collaboration with Fubon Art Foundation and BLANQ, a Taiwanese creative consulting firm. The collaborative concept was to create a non-profit, art project to raise awareness about sustainability in fashion. The outcome of the collaboration was an artistic demonstration of recycling: Levi’s jeans as wearable sculptures. The items were not for sale, only documented by photographs and short video clips posted on YouTube. Despite the lack of paid media, the small local art project had enough inherent interest thanks to the Brand and Artists involved to go viral and become a huge international hit – with millions of dollars worth of media impressions. This type of art fusion is called: Deconstruction.

The other example is a Levi’s collaboration with graffiti artist, KRINK. In this collaboration, KRINK and Levi’s created Art that consumers could buy. The limited edition collection of jeans, hoodies, t-shirts and jackets fused the edge of a Street Artist with the blue-collar aesthetic of Levi’s. The collection launched at an event bolstered by KRINK’S art displayed in store. It was a match made in heaven that resulted in a sell-out collection with plenty of crossover exposure for both parties. This type of art fusion is called: Integration.

What differentiates Integration from Deconstruction? In one word, everything. If Deconstruction leans toward representing the ‘Art’ side of art fusion, then Integration leans toward the ‘fusion’ side. Both accomplish specific purposes for Brands and Artists and have their distinct advantages and shortcomings.

In our next post, we’ll delve into those differences and classify the various stages of each. Stay tuned.

Brands that aren’t constantly creating new products to satisfy the ever-fickle consumer are few and far between. “Innovate” is on many a Brand Director’s To Do list. Yes, market research says things sell better with a ‘New’ flash on the package, but the result, too often, is a product that isn’t really all that new – only slightly different-looking and mostly just cheaper to manufacture. It’s this manufacturer-centric approach that leads to the mediocre, uninspired products.

The missed opportunity is a quest for products and services based on ingenuity, beauty and functionality – for which there is a market far greater than there has ever been. To quote Steve Jobs, “If you keep your eye on the profit, you’re going to skimp on the product. But if you focus on making really great products, then the profits will follow.”

A common fault many organizations are culpable of is clinging to their products’ past successes. Of course there’s wisdom in retaining equity, but too small a step in today’s marketplace can be akin to none at all. A modest ‘evolution’ is generally not what creates the buzz we crave for our brands.

Let’s face it, the world doesn’t need any more ‘manufacturer-centric’ products. What it needs is more ‘humanity-centric’ products, and plenty of them. Ask yourself what people wish for but can’t have. What would inspire them? What would amaze them? Then ask if your brand or product could be the answer once reinvented. Not just a slight restyling – but a re-imagining of what’s possible.

In today’s saturated market, asking these questions of your brand is no longer brave, but a matter of survival. Brands that have used art fusion collaborations as a testing ground for reinvention have enjoyed much success in past years. Many brands have effectively used art fusion as a low-risk way of reinventing a product as a limited-edition release.

Smart, we say.

A way to be daring without betting the farm. A way to see how the market reacts. To see if it creates buzz. See if it takes off. If it’s a runaway success, all your questions will be answered.

In our next post, we put the spotlight on a brand that has reinvented itself continually to stay a runaway success for over a century. Stay tuned.

Art fusion collaborations have proven so effective and have become so familiar around the world that savvy bloggers have begun to report new ones as ‘collabs’. But so far, very few have originated in Canada. Strange. Is it possible Canadian marketers aren’t thinking big enough for their brands? Or perhaps we think it has to be done on such a large scale as to be unaffordable for our smaller budgets (compared to the US). The former would be a shame and the latter would be incorrect.

Canada has some of the most unique brands, ripe for the often jaw-dropping benefits of art fusion. Imagine for instance, if a company like Tilley Endurables were to collaborate with an unexpected artist to reinvent one of their iconic hats in a limited edition release. Could they make a huge splash with their current clientele and attract a whole new younger, more urban audience all at once? Why, yes. Yes they could.

Could revered parka maker, Canada Goose get the social media world buzzing if they were to collaborate with a high profile film director or musician? Absolutely. Could coveted yoga gear maker, Lululemon create a frenzy of desire by collaborating with a hot textile designer to create a limited edition hoodie or yoga mat? Hell yes.

So why are we not seeing these and other large and small collaborations for our already culturally relevant Canadian brands? As artists and brands around the world have proven many times over, inventing or reinventing a product or service in a limited-edition release is not only an economical, but very effective way of getting attention or testing the market with something new. And as we’ve seen with the Cambridge Satchel Company, even a small, upstart brand can use art fusion to catapult themselves to top of mind for much less than a traditional advertising campaign.

So far, the best known art fusion collaboration born in Canada has been Roots x Douglas Coupland in 2010. The Canadian author of “generation x” expanded Roots’ brand both socially and culturally by offering a new angle on Canadian identity beyond beavers and the Canadian wilderness.