Excerpt from Four A's for Effort (1980's)

Here we have a reproduction of an ad produced by theAmerican Association of Advertising Agencies (AAAA) in the 1980's. It is possibly the most cynical and manipulative ad in professional advertising history.   Why this should be so is related to the fact that at the same time as it made use of semi-subliminal imagery to promote advertising, it also denigrated those critics who had the temerity to state that advertisers were using 'subliminal' ads in attempts to manipulate the thinking and behaviour of consumers.  Essentially the advertising profession at the time was saying loudly and vociferously that 'subliminal ads' did not exist and any reports of embedded figures or messages in ads were simply the result of the paranoid imagination of critics.

The ad contains two principal semi-subliminal figures.  Each figure is quite substantial in size and presumably intended to trigger negative emotional moods.  One at least can be seen in the thumbnail but if you are in doubt you can use the hyperlink to look at a larger version of the image.

You should have recognised a rather bleary-eyed 'face', slightly reminiscent of Frankenstein (top right), and the second of the two larger faces in the ad is that of a 'drowning' woman (bottom left). You can read more about these two ads and the Seagram's ads that follow on the Ads from the Archives page.

Excerpt from Seagrams Follies?

At around the same period that the AAAA were producing their ads, Seagram's Distillers also produced a couple of interesting ads.  Both ads, with the application of a little bit of imagination, can be shown to depict facial features.   True they are not lifelike. But the function of semi-subliminal advertising is to present information in a disguised manner and trigger emotions and influence the formation of ideas.  Their function is not to depict reality accurately, nor for the figures to be consciously recognised and appraised.

Each glass 'contains' a depiction of a 'sheepish, cheerful,and sozzled, alien'.    Each has their right eye open (the cherry), the left eye closed or closing (winking?) and a wryly aligned mouth.     The ad caption was 'Refreshing Seagram's Gin has hidden pleasure'.  

This ad, and other Seagram's ads, gulled Jack Haberstroh, a psychological consultant to Seagram's and author of the book Ice Cube Sex: The Truth about Subliminal Advertising.   He, like the advertising profession in general, claimed this type of ad does not exist and reports were simply figments of the imagination.

  Four excerpts from Ads of the Month

(relatively recent examples of semi-subliminal artwork from Dec 1998 to June 1999)

December 1998

 Whilst the name of the brand is MAIDWELL, the packaging is at odds with the brand name.  Take the name to mean 'The Maid (as in Maid Marion) is well' and you might then note that on the cover of the package, underneath the WELL of MAIDWELL, there is depicted the head and shoulders of a rather elderly and unwell maid, lying prostrate.

  She is grey in colour and it would seem as if she is not merely unwell, she has already departed this world for the next.  

April, 1999

Note that the young woman in this ad is not simply naked, she is asexual.   Despite her nakedness and her breasts, there are no nipples nor any indication of hair in her genital region.  However, there are other aspects of the advert that are clearly sexual in nature.  In the top left hand corner of the ad. there is a representation of an erect penis and testicles.  Embedded at the base of the penis is a face, looking towards the young woman.  There is, in fact many more elements to this ad and to make sense of it one has to take the perspective of a young woman.

On the second page of the ad the young woman is triumphantly raising her arms.  Her right hand (top left of ad) is covering up the voyeuristic and rampant male evident on the first page and her left hand (at the other side of the ad) is covering up another semi-subliminal aspect of the ad. 

Ico, clearly has power that other deodorants do not.  Users of Ico will not only be able to effect a change in the impression its users make upon those within sensory distance they will fend off the dangers of undesired advances and unwanted pregnancy.  Its miracle stuff.  It's in a can and all yours for just a few pounds. 

May, 1999

  Typical of a number of ads depicting a Marlboro cowboy this ad sports an embedded figure.   Usually the figures emphasise the theme of sex (heterosexual and/or homosexual)  or the theme of death.    Both themes have strong historical links with cigarette smoking.  Any semi-subliminal cues embedded in the ads are presumably calculated to trigger thoughts, emotions or moods associated with the relevant themes.  

In this ad look for a sexually indeterminate figure, an androgynous 'Gingerbread Man/Woman' or even a shaggy dog.    Clue: He/she/it is about knee high.    As with many figure-ground illusions which of the possible figures is perceived depends upon the point of the image on which attention is focussed.  Note also that the letters S and X X can be perceived if one focuses on the midpoint of the extract rather than the top.

June, 1999

  This series of ads devoted to Impulse Ico continues to develop.   The ads no longer purports to 'protect' young women from sexual advances and anxiety, it offers them a burgeoning sexuality under the protection of Impulse Ico.  

The ad gives viewers a nudge in the direction of a sexual interpretation by incorporating a whole series of shapes in the cracked ice at her feet that can be construed as the letters of the word sex (see the image on the right).  Note also the basic phallic shape in the centre of the second page of the ad.   Additionally, the female in the 'protected ice block' is beginning to develop sexually. Unlike the asexual young woman in the first series of ads, she has been presented on this occasion with breast nipples and and indication of pubic hair.

You can follow up any of these ads and other recent ads on the The Ads of the Month Page' page.

Some additional excerpts

Once you start looking for oddities in ads some oddities just 'jump out at you'.  It doesn't take much effort to see that the wires in this ad have been twisted into a close approximation of the word sex.   Whilst it might be socially acceptable to plug sex it is becoming less so to plug the sale of cigarette.  This trend might excalate if potential smokers knew that tobacco companies resorted to underhanded attempts to form mental associations between cigarette brands and sexual activity.

In the ad for Stella Artois exactly the same principle applies.  With a copy of the original you could either try standing on your head or turn the ad upside down.  In either case you would see that the condensation around the bottom of the glass forms shapes indicative of the letters SeX (two 'upper case' and one 'lower case'.  It therefore isn't only the price of Stella Artois that could bring one out in a sweat.  Incidentally, the next ad in the series had a mirror reversed message saying 'Thank You' - for the drink presumably.

This next ad with Carl Lewis, for Pirelli, may seem rather puzzling.  It deserves to be included in this section on 'sexy' ads but not because Carl is wearing red high heel shoes.  There is, in fact, a rather faint arrow pointing at his rear.    Taking into account other Pirelli ads in this series the possible connotations associated with an indicator pointing at ones anus leads to a number of intriguing possibilities.  

Whilst Carl might seem less than sexy initially, this is not so with this Mercedes ad. 

Take a closer look at Marilyn's beauty spot.  It is actually the Mercedes sign.  And, on the original you can also note that the veins on her cheek have been touched up to provide a supplementary 'message' that can be 'read' as sex.   Such a message would seem superflous if it were not intended to  function at the level of the unconscious.   Additionally, would you expect pin-up posters to be published with apparent blemishes on them if there were not a good reason.  

Finally, a more obvious example featuring Jim Beam or Robby the Robot.    The caption (I wish I had the guts to drink a Jim Beam) provides a clue to the most obvious elements of this ad.  See the insert on right.  Again you ought to be able to perceive that well known word (the e is reversed) plus an easily recognisable phallic shape pointing towards 5 o'clock.

Most of the ads illustrated here are easy to interpret and explain but there are a few other topics regularly emphasised in some ads which require more than just an appreciation of associative conditioning to explain the rationale underlying their use.   These help provide more than a healthy balance to ads focussing on sex.

Bear in mind, as noted above, none of the ads illustrated here is an isolated example.   They are not aberations in printing nor the outcome of change or serendipity.   The vast majority are part of systematic attempts, using thematically based series of ads, to influence the consumer without their being consciously aware of these attempts. To find out more about any of the ads noted above or others related to them click on the search programme icon below. Alternatively just browse through the Contents list that you will find in the final sections of this page.

Recommended Reading

until

Sexy, Subliminal & Deadly? The Psychology of Manipulative Advertising

is published.

Three Books by Wilson B. Key

For an interesting commentary on one of the ads analysed by Wilson Key see the Classic Key page.

Finally - Lets go to work.*

* This illustration supplied courtesy of Reservoir Ads