We went to a holiday to Italy in 1980. We realized there was a Dolce and Gabbana shop there, so we went in to look around. We saw

very nice clothes there, but they were too expensive. We got some brochures about the

history of this famous fashion brand. Then we left the shop and went into a Benetton shop,

either. There the shopkeeper was talking about Benetton…

The two famous fashion-desingers

The so-called Dolce and Gabbana brand was created by two men, Domenico Dolce and Stefano Gabbona, and known all

over the world. They are stylists who were able to accomplish their Italian identity, while they had unique

style. They are loved by famous people from Hollywood, they have been dressing rock and film stars. They are the stylists of Madonna, Monica Bellucci, Beyonce és Kylie

Minogue, Victoria Beckham.

Today, the Benetton Group is

present in 120 countries

around the world.

Benetton’s advertising history resembles the company’s history… 

1972: Benetton conferred its' advertising campaigns to the Eldorado agency, who opted

almost exclusively for a poster campaign. 

1982: Photographer Oliviero Toscani (b. in 1942 in Milano in Italy) from the Eldorado agency started working with Benetton.

1984: The press and poster campaign were simple, joyful and colorful, six visuals of adults, and six visuals of kids, in a festive display of ethnic and clothing colors "All the world's colors!"

1985: The visuals changed, from groups to couples, to show the products to advantage, if in an

eccentric way : for example two little girls sharing the same

sweater, and gradual hues shown by super-imposed pullovers, five

at a time...

Other posters showed two little black boys kissing each other,

with little US and USSR flags in their hair and painted on their cheeksÉ "United Colors of

Benetton".After a visit form a U.N.E.S.C.O. official, who stated "This is the United Colors here!", Benetton

decided to uses the name officially.

1986: Two little black boys figured again on a newspaper ad, united by a globe and a chain with the peace symbol. The globe

became a symbol of unification, and appeared on all the posters that year with the

message : all colours are equal, just as all men are equal. Stuffed animals dressed in Benetton clothes advertised the new 012

collection.

1987: Benetton. World of Jeans." became the company's jeans slogan.

 

1988: The new campaign mixes cultures and legends : Adam and Eve,

Joan of Arc and Marilyn Monroe, Leonardo de Vinci and Julius CaesarÉ all captioned with the slogan : "United Superstars of Benetton". The 012 label

showed masked children in pairs : a wolf and a lamb, a cat and a dog :

"United Friends of Benetton". Benetton brought out a eau de toilette : "Colors", whose name

was written out by hand by Bruno Suter, Eldorado's president, in

yellow, red, green and blue on the rectangular bottle's four sides. The poster presented two feminine hands, one white and the other one black, enlacedÉ handing each other the perfume: "Perfume of the World".

1989: caption "United Colors of Benetton". A commercial made by Toscani won the Lion d'Or at the Cannes Festival, and the "United Colors of Benetton" campaign was awarded the 16th Grand Prix for best Poster : a black hand and a white hand linked by a handcuff, a black woman breast-feeding a white babyÉ these photographs were symbols of brotherhood in the world, and a desire for communication, with one's differences. A photograph of a choir, with children dressed identically, singing "Oh Christmas Tree..."

1990: Publicity played on the theme of confrontation between black and white this year, through a series of posters, but did not present the clothes at all.

1991 Three young ethnically varied faces sticking their tongues out figured on huge billboards throughout cities. Pinnochio: a series of wooden marionettes running behind each other… a cloud of multi-colored condoms… multi-colored dead leaves floating on the surface of an oil spill… rows and rows of crosses in an American cemetery… shock images to startle us, shifting from a serene, positive aesthetic sense (beauty of rich colors, or the green and white of peace) to negative backgrounds (black of the polluted oil spill, so many post war deaths). Toscani played more than ever on the contradictory note of duality, that "dividing line between two waters" : "war/peace, flirtation/sex, beauty/pollutionÉ Such posters had an ethical dimension, but refused to impose a moral. The message was ambivalent, and left us free to come up with our own answers to the questions they raised :.

1992: French billstickers refused to post the Benetton campaign, which they decried as "reality-advertising" or pure sensationalism. The subjects? David Kirby, Aids victim, dying, his family at his bedside, an African guerrilla holding a Kalachnikov and a human leg bone, a boat overcrowded with Albanians, a group of African refugees, a car in flames after a Mafia bombing, a family weeping before the bloodied corpse of a Mafioso, two Indians caught in a flood in Calcutta,É Toscani's photographs provoke a wave of debate each time, and of course make people talk about BenettonÉ through press debates, etc.

 

1993: „Don't wear people who need them most." A massive campaign was carried out, and the Benetton family was presented, all smiles, "Thank you!". Luciano Benetton even posed in the nude for the poster with the slogan " I want my clothes back". 

1994: The campaign was very diversified : a mosaic of a thousand photographs of people and the same message : Aids . A Pair of bloodied trousers and shirt, a young Bosnian sniper's clothes, killed in combat. A white hand holding out the relay baton to a black hand.

 

Oliviero Toscani presented twelve years of advertising photography in an exhibition at the Contemporary Art Museum in Lausanne (Benetton by Toscani). Since 1984, Benetton and the photographer Toscani had received numerous awards and prizes for their publicity campaigns.

Luciano Benetton : "The purpose of advertising is not to sell more. It's to do with institutional publicity, whose aim is

to communicate the company's values (...) We need to convey a single strong image,

which can be shared anywhere in the world."

Oliviero Toscani pursues this : "I am not here to sell pullovers, but to promote an i

mage"... Benetton's advertising draws public attention to universal themes like racial integration, the protection of the

environment, Aids...

……In Italy we met a rich Norwegian men and we asked In Italy we met a rich Norwegian men and we asked him how he had become rich. He let us know that he him how he had become rich. He let us know that he had an oil-business in Norway and that is the reason had an oil-business in Norway and that is the reason of his richness. We found this story very interesting of his richness. We found this story very interesting and the man took us to Norway and talked about the and the man took us to Norway and talked about the history of Norwegian oil…history of Norwegian oil…

The Norwegian oil-adventure.

In the late 1960´s, scientist found oil outside the coast of Norway. This started an era that has made Norway

one of the richest countries in the world.

In 1966 oil prospecting began in the Norwegian sector of the North Sea. In 1966 oil prospecting began in the Norwegian sector of the North Sea. By the autumn of 1969 Philips Petroleum company decided to bore, the By the autumn of 1969 Philips Petroleum company decided to bore, the drill steam of the Ocean Viking ring struck an oil field. It was actually drill steam of the Ocean Viking ring struck an oil field. It was actually amongst the ten largest in the world. Norway had become an oil nation! amongst the ten largest in the world. Norway had become an oil nation!

In the 1960`s the Storting had put together a legal framework that gave the state strict control ,and a large income, from oil operations. To prevent Norway becoming simply an exporter of crude oil and gas, the authorities aimed to build up a national oil industry.

To prevent Norway becoming simply an exporter of crude oil and gas, the authorities aimed to build up a national oil industry.

The maritime oil business could be a risky one. In 1997 there was an uncontrolled blow-out in the Ekofisk Field that caused an oil leak and pollution alert on the Norwegian coast.

1990 Norway overtook Britain as 1990 Norway overtook Britain as Europe’s largest oil producer, and by the Europe’s largest oil producer, and by the mid-1990s Norway had become the mid-1990s Norway had become the second largest oil exporter in the world second largest oil exporter in the world

after Saudi- Arabiaafter Saudi- Arabia. .

The oil trade posed great challenges for industry and research. The most spectacular monuments to this new technology were the gigantic rigs. In the summer of 1995 the world’s largest oil rig was towed out to the Troll Field, which at the time was Europe’s largest maritime gas field.

The new industry demanded a highly qualified labour force using modern high techology. At the start of the 1990s about 20,000 people were employed in the oil industry, about 1% of the total labour force. Many of them lived in Stavanger, which became the country’s oil capital.

…On the way home we were listening to Nena in the car, we liked it very much and since we were just approaching Germany, we jumped in and visited a Nena

concert…

A Song of a girl from Ingolstadt, Bavaria goes to the top of the American charts.

The 44- year-old Nena edited and published a

new album and went on to a tour.

Undoubtedly this lady is a pearl of German pop life, a miracle of the ´80s. She is cool, clever, and kind. She broke into pop world

with her song called ˝ 99 Red Ballons ˝. She became the first in the pop list in England and

the second in the USA.

She was born on 24th March in Hagen. She attended primary and secondary school here. After leaving secondary school she studied between 1977 and 1979. She had her first record in 1979 with the band called ˝The Stripes˝

The End