Over the last couple of months, one of the most important secondary activities in the business world has been the preparation, purchase and distribution of New Year’s gifts for the company’s clients and friends. When it comes to selecting a calendar, this rarely goes beyond purchasing photos on commercial sites, while the design and the messages for note books are usually dealt with by agencies. Unfortunately, all this is often considered only at the level of design, not as part of the strategic visionary communication of the company.
In this sense, an example circulating on the internet to this day pushes the boundaries of the “visionary”. For the design of their corporate calendar, the Russian Gefest Insurance Company, with the help of their agency Burjui Design Bureau, engaged the designer Evgeny Kazantsev, who made a series of illustrations called “Cataclysm Happens.”
Kazantsev created a series of surreal illustrations showing how the world, and human life on it, could look after the planet is transformed by natural disasters.
How much these illustrations are actually a “scare tactic” to sell insurance, and how much a hyperbolic reality, is illustrated by recent climate indicators: the near-bust seasons at world famous ski resorts, increasingly unbearable summers, and the reduction of the glaciers of Mount Everest by 20% over the past forty years.
On the other hand, the example shows just how much benefit can be gained by a little courage and commitment in deciding on New Year’s materials; the engagement of an artist with a vision for creative corporate materials – and for months you have a story on the world’s web portals. The message? Expect the unexpected.
