Just Jazz?   Camel Holsten PilsNatWest

Flora Big Smith

Just Jazz?

What has this man on the left got to hide?  Not a lot perhaps. That might be why some YSL advertising makes use of some neat imagery to offer slight compensation.     Another YSL ad shown below takes a tip from the world of Silk Cut cigarettes.   See the large image associated with the ad illustrated below for the organ YSL dare not show.

What! You cannot see anything unusual.  Well, perhaps not, this sort of thing goes on all the time in public squares and on beaches not just in advertising. But see the blow-up on the right for a different slant on things (no pun intended). Once you have noted that it is a guys head behind the trumpet you will soon get the idea pretty quickly.

As Mae West is once reputed to have said  'Is that a banana in your pocket, or do you just like me?  YSL, eat your heart out.

Beach Bum?

This is a rather obvious, completely uninhibited, compulsive, public masturbator. He features here courtesy of Camel cigarettes.  He has nothing to hide, so it seems.   You can see more of the surrounding scene and other interesting aspects of the ad from which this figure was extracted on the Camel cigarette page.

Taking the Pils

In terms of seriousness this coaster would not seem to rank very highly.  The caption on the back indicates that after a night drinking Holsten Pils one is most likely to end up eating Holsten Pils beer mats.   When you consider the coasters more intently you realize that this is not simply an attempt to sell Holsten Pils on the strength of rather dubious humour. 

Look at the right hand side of the coaster and you will see a shape reminiscent of a finger - or it may be considered a phallic shape. Anything longer than it is wide can, of course, be considered phallic. Additionally, if one looks also at the shirt worn by the rather scruffy individual in the centre of the coaster it is easy to see what appears to be a Rhinoceros horn.  It is off-centre so one cannot easily imagine that it is intended to be indicative of an erection.  But it probably is. Note that this is much more prominent on the coasters than on any of the posters using the same imagery.

Look more carefully at the phallic/finger shape on the right.  It is actually composed of letters.  These are S E and X.  The combination of all of these elements leaves little doubt that no matter how scruffy you look, if you drink Holsten Pils you will be able to 'have it off' against the competition.   If you believe, that you will believe anything - but then members of the advertising profession know thatalready, don't they?   Sexually explicit material will always attract the young, unsophisticated and gullible - and the elderly, sophisticated, city slickers.  Whether or not sex sells products, it always grabs attention, as this Big Smith jeans promotion of the Wilt down man and other ads elsewhere on this site indicate only too well. 

Many of the other pages on this site give some consideration to the reasons why semi-subliminal adverts, containing images and words that are not consciously noticed, tend to emphasize the subject of sex (but you know why already, don't you?).

Pepper'n'Spice?

This seems an innocuous enough ad. And it is for a product that one would not normally associate with embedded imagery or semi-subliminal advertising.   Flora, nowadays, is associated with marathon running, research into heart disease, and other laudable activities.  However take a closer look at the crotch area of the manikin.  This reveals an element that one would not normally associate with pepper, though it could add spice to a relationship. 

The image clearly does not present anatomically correct information.  Nevertheless there are aberrations in the reflections on this pepper (they could not occur naturally).   The central area of the resulting image is therefore seemingly intended to be perceived as a representation of an erect penis - pointing left rather than upright.  The 'correct' position is, however, possibly indicated in the pepper positioned to the right and above the genital area in the area representing the lower torso area of the body (see left). In this second instance, the 'erection' is presented in the lighter shade of red rather than the darker red of the image above right.

Whilst this interpretation may seem to be a 'long stretch of the imagination' and likely to be disputed, such objections become less likely when one considers other ads in the same series.  At least two of these ads (and possibly four) make use of phallic shapes (one was double headed), innuendoes (it's harder) or additional embedded artwork (the letters s e x). Overall, these ads can be viewed on the Flora page and present the sexualized message; 'Flora is not simply good for you, it is sexy'.

Flora's key competitor, namely Delight, also produced ads at the same time which were semi-subliminally sexualized. Presumably the Delight ads were intended to ensure that Flora did not benefit unduly from the semi-subliminal elements in its advertising.  Which campaign made use of the semi-subliminal content first is not clear.

The Delight ads had captions such as 'I've just discovered a new delight' and made use of embedded artwork or cleverly composed body postures (e.g. contorted, foreshortened, arms). The goal in each case was to enhance the more overly erotic/intimate relationships initially depicted by young male and female models, latterly by cartoon figures.

Incidentally, surprising as it may seem, the peppery Flora ad discussed here became a 'pinup' in an office I worked in.  It may have been selected by the secretaries for reasons related to a love of salads. I suspect there was a strong (unconscious) influence from the little 'added ingredient' illustrated above. They may have been reminded of classic works of erotic art epitomized by the horny little fellow on the right, as were the artists for the two ads mentioned below.

For yet another phallocratic ad, for the smokers in the audience, courtesy of Silk Cut Ultra. And another, courtesy of Jack Daniel whiskey, see Viva Espa�a.