Sponsorship and Transparency
Summary:
Sponsorship is a cash and/or in-kind fee paid to a property (typically in sports, arts, entertainment or causes). For example, a corporate entity may provide equipment for a famous athlete or sports team in exchange for brand recognition. The sponsor earns popularity this way while the sponsored can earn a lot of money. A particular form of specialized brand sponsorship where a brand sponsors an unusual event or pastime that then becomes synonymous with that brand (to the point where future brands may be excluded from participation) is known as 'aboutsponsorship'. This provides a strong walled-garden sponsorship relationship between particular events and the brand.
“Sponsorship” Wikipedia. April 2011. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sponsor_%28commercial%29>
Transparency
A: free from pretense or deceit
B: easily detected or seen through
C: readily understood
D: characterized by visibility or accessibility of information especially concerning business practices
Spurlock, Morgan. “Morgan Spurlock: The greatest TED Talk ever sold.” TED. March 2011. April 2011. <http://www.ted.com/talks/morgan_spurlock_the_greatest_ted_talk_ever_sold.html>
Interest:
I am interested in how companies that sponsor events and venues such as public schools, book signings, sports arenas, race car teams, bus stops affect the individuals who see the sponsorship and how it affects the intentions of the sponsored. I like to think that my artwork makes the sponsorship of magazines transparent. I would also like to find other objects, organizations and artists that function in the same way. I am curious how I can make my work more transparent and how I can find out more about the effects of sponsorship on people. I would also like to experience being sponsored by someone or a business myself to see how I would react to being given money and having to compromise my beliefs for profit.
Quotes:
“Over the course of this film we had 500 plus companies who were up and down companies say no they didn’t want any part of this project they wanted nothing to do with this film mainly because they had no control. They would have no control over the final product. But we did get 17 brand partners who were willing to relinquish that control who wanted to be in business with someone as mindful and playful as myself. And who ultimately empowered us to tell stories that normally we wouldn’t be able to tell.” – Morgan Spurlock
Spurlock, Morgan. “Morgan Spurlock: The greatest TED Talk ever sold.” TED. March 2011. April 2011. <http://www.ted.com/talks/morgan_spurlock_the_greatest_ted_talk_ever_sold.html>
“Demonstrators have thrown an oil-like substance and feathers on the entrance to Tate Britain in London in protest at its acceptance of BP sponsorship.”
“Protesters foul Tate Britain over BP art sponsorship” BBC News. June 2010. April 2011. <http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/10431694>
“The failed amendment specifically targeted military sponsorship of NASCAR teams. The U.S. Army, National Guard and Air Force will spend about $30 million combined this year to sponsor Sprint Cup teams.”
“U.S. House rejects NASCAR sponsorship ban” PilotOnline.com. April 2011
“It sounds like an Adbusters editorial: an activist's dream. But in São Paulo, Brazil, the dream has become a reality.
In September last year, the city's populist right-wing mayor, Gilberto Kassab, passed the so-called Clean City laws. Fed up with the "visual pollution" caused by the city's 8,000 billboard sites, many of them erected illegally, Kassab proposed a law banning all outdoor advertising. The skyscraper-sized hoardings that lined the city's streets would be wiped away at a stroke. And it was not just billboards that attracted his wrath: all forms of outdoor advertising were to be prohibited, including ads on taxis, on buses—even shopfronts were to be restricted, their signs limited to 1.5 metres for every 10 metres of frontage. "It is hard in a city of 11 million people to find enough equipment and personnel to determine what is and isn't legal," reasoned Kassab, "so we have decided to go all the way."
Burgoyne, Patrick “São Paulo: The City That Said No To Advertising” Bloomsberg Businessweek. April 2011. <http://www.businessweek.com/innovate/content/jun2007/id20070618_505580.htm>
Further Reading:
Image/Video:
Future sale of a baby’s name to sponsorship of Snickers.
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