PROPOSED VANDALISM. Is Artistic Advertising Doomed?

Free Lance, Volume IV, Issue 174, 31 October 1903, Page 6

PROPOSED VANDALISM. Is Artistic Advertising Doomed?

SINCE Sir William Steward's poetic soul was stirred to horlor by the vandalism that impelled advertisers to make rocks and trees the innocent instruments in the hand of the travelling fiend for panegyncs on pills or lyncs on lotions, it has occurred to other statesmen that the disfiguring advertising artist had better go slow We find the Hon Mr Wigiam, who has, we believe, some knowledge of municipal affaus, proposing a new clause for insertion in the Municipal Coiporations Bill, giving- power to municipal authorities to stay the hand of the man who wants to cover up ugly hoardings with picturesque subjects America, having used up all its available hoardings and sky-sciapers, started a while back to placard the cows in the paddocks alongside the railroads Then several million dollais were raised to project an advertisement on the moon, to be vis lble over the whole of the hemisphere Someone slid with the dollars, of course, and the moon idea melted If people believed adver-

tisements, and could be persuaded that much-advertised remedies, hair lotions, or chest protectors, were what the works of art referred to set forth, any clause giving any corporation power to burn them all would be really virtuously just * * • People don't believe advertisements, and advertisers don't intend them to believe them It is only by constant reiteiation of a statement that isn't fact that the article pictonally boomed becomes familiarised to the public Germany has a law providing that an advertiser who makes statements (such, as for instance, "We are selling under cost '") must act up to them, or appear in court to answer a charge of fraud ' This, of course, proves that the average German Leheves what a hoarding" tells him, and is liable to be duped New Zealanders smile, and don't believe — but they buy advertised wares more readily, reasoning that if a firm can afford to advertise well its goods are good goods, although not such good goods as the advertiser declares * * * In Wellington, there are some miles of the most unsightly fences on earth We speak with a knowledge of a goodsized piece of the earth If the lady m the straightfi onted corset the gentleman "with that bald spot," the heavenly youngstei blowing bubbles, "The searchlight reveals," etc , a few well-paint-ed butter roosters, and the designs we know so well, were substituted, it wo>uld be a perfect godsend and a relief to the fastidious wayfarer Who wouldn't have the reclamation and its odors hidden by art, even if it were pill art ? Who would not piefer a luxuriance of liver literature and art for fences in Adelaideroad, in place of decayed iron tanks, rotten posts, and rusty wire If the Councils are given power to prohibit artistic advertising, and use it, when, by so doing, they may keep hideous eyesores unhidden, we shall be obliged to declare that Councils are a soulless people, who might go into raptures over the tram sheds as art- treasures, worthy of the same veneration as St Paul's Cathedral compels