Short version
» In 1986 an American pop artist designed a famous advert for a global vodka brand.
» The global vodka brand has launched a limited edition bottle referencing his advert.
» The artist's name was Keith Haring.
» Hence the two-day bolxfest at (C)haring Cross.
You wouldn't know anything was amiss down on the platforms or lower passageways. No renaming has taken place because TfL don't dare risk that any more after Burberry Street got so much negative publicity. Only at the foot of the escalator would you start to notice that all the digital adverts had been taken over by a singular brand of vodka. And only at the top in the ticket hall might you start to put all the pieces together.
They've slapped a lot of extra roundels everywhere - on the walls and on the floors - each with the C of CHARING replaced by one of Keith Haring's dancing people. Nobody can complain about accessibility if you amend roundels that weren't originally there. The roundels also include a Harling-designed bottle of vodka, because if you're going to spend hundreds of thousands on a branding activation you need to get the product in somewhere. It's all quite in-your-face, but unless you were familiar with the artist (or had read the press release) the rationale could have remained a total mystery.
In the ticket hall, inside the gateline, a number of branded staff stood beside branded adverts behind a branded logo. On the wall was a pad of reproduction posters from the original 1986 campaign for people to tear off and take away, which on the face of it was a generous art giveaway but more truthfully just an advert for some vodka. The attendant staff made no attempt to lure commuters over, not while I was passing, nor was the display suitably-angled either for those going out or coming in. I did see one lady wandering off with a scrolled-up sheet later but I bet most of those using the station missed the opportunity.
Part 2 of the takeover is outside the gateline in an empty retail unit. This has been transformed into a mini-art gallery with two of Haring's original vodka artworks in pride of place. They've not been on show in London before so this is arguably the good bit. Inevitably between the two pictures was a branded vodka bottle in a glass case purporting to be a third work of art, but looking instead like a large sample bottle after a really long wee. Alas the barrier outside anticipating queues proved unnecessary, even during the morning rush hour, and I was vastly outnumbered by branded staff keen to ask me what I thought. "It's an advert," I said, and they just grinned.
<bolx>The Artist-Edition bottle’s design pulses with energy: a debossed rhythm of dancing figures brought to life in his signature blaze of reds and yellows, cut sharply against Absolut’s distinctive blue. Signed off with Haring’s unmistakable signature on the shrink sleeve, the result is a piece of 3D kinetic art that transforms the original painting into something you can hold, admire and toast with.</bolx>
A lot of creative people had clearly expended a lot of effort to devise, construct and staff the two-day activation pop-up, which won't have come cheap. Arguably they tried too hard and made too little impact on those passing through the station, merely to promote a special edition bottle that's currently only available at duty-free shops. But if the whole point was to garnerpublicity across the media they clearly succeeded, because nothing sounds so interesting as a tube station pop-up you never saw, thereby avoiding the underwhelm of seeing it in person.
