Why do "Corporate Art Styles" Feel Fake?
ฝัง
- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 5 ก.พ. 2021
- Twitter: / solar_sas
Second Channel: / @solarsands2
2:57 credit to Jianan Liu
Music in order of Appearence:
Kevin MacLeod - Crinoline Dreams
Hans Zimmer - Mountains
18 Carat Affair - Modus Operandi
Kevin MacLeod - Samba Isobel
Ryo Kawasaki - Sweet Tears
Tobacco - Refbatch
Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License
creativecommons.org/licenses/b...
Sources:
www.wired.co.uk/article/corpo...
eyeondesign.aiga.org/dont-wor...
qz.com/quartzy/1728767/why-ed...
www.are.na/s-k-y-e/small-cart...
buck.co/work/facebook-alegria
www.are.na/claire-l-evans/cor...
A. M. Cassandre - Henri Mouron - บันเทิง
Yes I mispronounced the name "Kurzgesagt" sorry. For the record I did look up how the channel narrator himself pronounced it and I thought he said it in that way clearly I didn't listen closely enough sorry. Also a small note at 7:25 I fail to mention that the New Yorker has been using flat illustration characters for a while but I think there's still a slight difference between these covers and the kinds of characters they usually have.
This is a pinned comment by the creator of the video, yet after 7 hours it only has 3 likes.
The yt algorithm confuses me sometimes
:)
Neat
phonetic: courts-ge-sagt ( 2x hard 'G' ) ;-)
Kursgeskakt? Wth dude?
this art style is just visual representation of what a spotify ad feels like.
I remember the one I think you're talking about. Most everything was green and there was a stereotypical striped beach ball.
*laughes in premium*
@@blackaf1s597 *laughs in broke*
@@blackaf1s597 laughs in mp3
@@blackaf1s597 *laughs in mod*
The official art style of "Trust us we are totally not going to use your data for any unethical purposes"
_holy crap_
holy crap
Holy crap
holy crap
holy crap
The style has a strange… indescribable feeling. It’s like they are trying to fool you into thinking they care about their individual customers.
@Boom bow Factual
Toxic positivity and rigid conformity is the hallmark of the modern corporate world.
This artstyle makes me feel like I'm a lifeless city of marble granite and glass, it just looks Gentrified.
The problem is it has the _conventions_ of a lively and unique style, but with absolutely no personality behind it. It's basically just a more evolved clip art
I know. It’s really creepy, take us back to frutiger aero please.
This art style feels like it was designed to be emotional by someone incapable of feeling emotion
Yes. YES. YES
God these comments are spot on
Alegria was made for Facebook. Have you seen a picture of Zuckerberg? His wax sculpture looks more human than he does.
Ah, a Vulcan tried to follow a Bob Ross tutorial.😅
It was
its not that the artstyle is hated, its what it represents. which is the bloated, monopolistic, corporations that uses it. it personally feels like a horrifying, shapeshifting monster pretending to be something trustworthy, only to gut your wallet and privacy for their own profit
Hmm sounds kind of familiar
Are we... are we suggesting that corporations are the mimics of the capitalist economic system?
@@e.s.r5809 NAHHHHH
@@e.s.r5809 suddenly.. "ROLL INITIATIVE"
@@mollofistraye5164 the bard seduced the dragon so now he's facing off against the real big bad... capitalism
In an attempt not to offend anybody, they relate to nobody.
Well put :)
Are you saying you’re *not* a blue person with a tiny head?
NintendoHub wut?
@@simpleman8883 That's what they always draw people like, some weird purple or blue skin color and completely messsed up proportions
Yup
So inclusive it's exclusive
So universal it's alienated
So unique it's homogeneous
Don't be confused, these juxtapositions are done by purpose.
Yikes and I agree with you
This comment is so good it's great
Overall: So false it's infallible.
Wtf you just described left-wingers (or democracy as a whole)
Slavery is freedom. War is peace. You will own nothing and you will be happy.
It’s not that the art is inherently bad, it’s that it represents something much darker. The soulless feel of it all. It feels like a mask that the suits put on to appear human. Skinwalker behaviour.
Which makes it inherently bad.
"Skinwalker behavior"
Cool it with the anti-semitic remarks.
I'm sick of the apologies constantly assaulting my mind while watching this video. The art is inherently bad. It's fine to say that the corporate stink tanks don't know what they're doing and are leading everyone blindly off a cliff.
Oy Vey!
A lot of it is bad, with its goofy proportions like giant arms and small heads.
Would imagine the creator of that style has brain damage.
The weird thing about this art style is I don't like or hate it, it just exists.
Same. Can’t really feel any hatred for that...
Same. And also I do not care it exist, doesn't drawn me to it. It just...exist like it have no function..
This.
Yes
I would describe it as bland
Basically, it's offensively inoffensive.
THANK YOU. CANT WORD IT BETTER THAN THAT
Just like TH-cam's TH-cam Rewinds
so true
@@Fordandra amazingly true
Exactly! Like the skin colour. Race has always been controversial. Who gets more represented in advertising conveys who is more important for the corporation (who the corporation panders to). Let's not confront the strange societal dynamic - let's create a world without race and so racial tensions
it's crazy how an almost indescribable trait like "soullessness" is instantly felt by the majority of people when looking at this kind of art. just empty, unfeeling lines and colors. it's at the point where they don't even feel human-generated anymore, they're like clip art
This! Spots on
"How do you know the soul exists?"
"Because its absence is perceptible"
This is clip art. I remember having classes in school around 2007 about how to use Word and PowerPoint.The teachers kept pushing the students to use clip art instead of images downloaded from online, and pretty much all of the clip art looked like this corporate adtstyle. Completeley soulless
@@Drakey_Fenix i'd much rather use stock images and mash them together into whatever i want.[i made robot godilla hybrid by doing this]
It shouldn't be called "art"!
The one thing that irks me the most with these corporate artstyles is the "optimism" and all the happy smiles with the characters is to appeal to you as 'Hey were just like you here in the Big Corpo' and said art can be visible a click away from them publicly apologizing for the most heinous shit known to man
That's called plain folks and bandwagon .
Reminds me of American pharmaceutical drug TV commercials where they are describing the various side effects of the medicine that can ruin your life or kill you. And the man in the background is just laughing with his arms around his wife and children in a slo-mo shot. It's so damn creepy and these companies should be forced to cut away to a warning screen when they are telling you that their medicine has a recognizable chance of actually killing you.
@@bl1zz4rd25 its actually called kitsch.
This art style just screams “we don’t sell your data”
"We just monetize it. Honest... it's NOT the same thing!"
"we didn't sell your data, we promise!"
Very nice comment, anyways we just updated our privacy policy and want to remind you that we value your privacy
I’m crying
"we" "don't" "sell" "your" "data"
It feels like something a government would use excessively in a dystopian world to convince you that nothing is wrong.
mark my words, it will happen like that
It's already too late. Welcome to Idiocracy.
With the agravant that governments MAYBE can be held accountable for their wrongdoings. Corporations, speacially Big Tech, can do whatever they want to us without repercussion
It's exactly that. The corrupt people in big tech and the corrupt people in government are cut from the same cloth and interact with one another
@@maxalaintwo3578 Sadly yeah, politics is just a facade to hide that fact that everyone worships money. While we fight, they get all the cash.
Ah, yes, "instead of just putting people of different colors in our art, we opted to just make them blue instead!" very progressive and relatable
Ah yes, gotta please the smurf community!
It unites us all in our disgust for the style.
@@kutiethekatright… maybe green?
I feel that this art style is most prevelant among companies that want to be seen as “progressive” too. Since it represents a wide range of different looking people, I often see it in a context of “look guys, we’re not racist!”… which just makes me question their choice of non-existent skin tones even more.
This ad literally looks like what fake bad comercials look like in movies
Lol
In GTA we can watch TV and the ads is good and funny
Agreed.
this ad is literally that ad for air in the lorax movie
or like that souless mobile game ads (i also sad that we actually got souless meme )
I can't explain it, but this art style gives off a huge toxic positivity vibe. It's like that one person who will plot to kill you if you're not smiling and having a good time.
theres something off putting about it. other than the fact that its simply annoying to the eye, its just unsettling to look at.
They all look fucking dead inside with their little eyes and blend smiles.
They don't look natural, they don't look human.
It's like they're trying to appeal nice and soft to then nicely grab you by the neck and make you do what they Want.
To attract you in their trap.
@@TheLTprod what
it's art style of: we like you very much, untill you want to cancel your subscription or are unsatisfied, then you're a bad dog
we happy few
As an artist, I want to feel when I look at art. When I look at corporate art, I feel nothing, and feeling nothing makes me begin to ask questions.
Any type of questions in particular?
j e w s
After examining the style, I've come up with a hypothesis on just why we tend to see it as psychopathic.
The first thing that stands out to me is that characters seem to exhibit what I'm gonna refer to as "reverse-neoteny". Neoteny describes childlike and appealing features, and as an example, humans are neotenous compared to other great apes. We have very reduced browridges, flatter faces, bulbous heads, expressive faces and much less broad body shapes, making us look more similar to juvenile hominids than adult ones.
The "corporate artstyle", however, despite commonly viewed as infantile, is the reverse of these features. Big, disproportionately broad torsos and limbs with tiny heads that, in the half of the time they do have faces, are extremely simplified and comparable to the NPC meme.
These unappealing features seem to do a good job at dehumanizing the humans they're intended to represent, and in tandem with the otherwise kiddy style supplementing the grossly proportioned figures, give it the "soulless" and psychopathic look.
Good anslysis
this is an excellent analysis. I would go as far as to say that it activates fight or flight instincts because we're hardwired to fear these kinds of proportions if we see them in real life.
WOW buddy
By ignoring human features, they activate the parts of our brain that were designed not to like this?
Is it just me or are we looking too deep? Like, I didn't have any problems with this art until I came across this video and comments (I still don't have problems with the art),why should they look realistic? This style is all about abstract shapes and bright colors, so why would we want to make it realistic?
i love how every time a corporation tries to seem like a human, the more and more it feels like it doesn't have a soul
well discord isn't falling with it... yet
@@the_hhhh because they don't care (pretend to?). They feel like random furry lol
I mean, they don't
How about stop pretending to be human and actually fixing the product.
Laptops now exhaust heat through the bottom case, which melts the plastic holder by trapped heat on its bottom and then it affects every other part of the product if not supported by cooling pad for example.
Being human is more than just looks like one. Only consider human - those who actually tries to fix something without denigrating it.
Sort of an uncanny value effect
corporate art: even when the colors are warm, their tone is cold.
Especially when we're talking about monolithic tech corps like TH-cam and Facebook.
their tone is soulless like dead body
damn this is poetic
except most times they don’t use warm color tones, it’s always lots of blues, grays, and greens, but sometimes they’ll throw a red or orange in there
@@anna_banana414 That bit of warm color gives the illusion of warmth in appearance and movement even when there really is none.
I think it's just the clear attempt at manipulating the audience that makes me so unnerved about the corporate art styles. There's nothing inherently wrong to me about pictures of simple, purple or green people, laughing and having fun together - in fact I kind of artistically value art that focuses on every day enjoyment of things, and i really like creative simplicity. It's the knowledge that this is done because the app is trying to play some kind of mind game with me, to make me associate happiness and smiles with the app in some kind of genuine capacity, that it's placed on top of data mining and stealing, that it isn't GENUINE, which fucks me up. The context of where the art is placed is just as important at what the art looks like. It comes off as inherently ironic because everyone knows Facebook is shit.
Nah, the simplistic art style on its own screams of "take care of yourself" culture of not trying hard ever at anything. It looks sterile of any deep feelings and emotionally immature. Like, any secure person doesn't need vivid colors in their designs to make them feel a certain way.
Anything to avoid scaring off potential customers.
@@krunkle5136 eh yeah, I mean it's definitely simple to make it more easily relatable and marketable. But I do think simplicity can also have its own beauty to it, and there are some emotions that are simple and portraying them that way is pretty cool.
I mean, advertising has always tried to manipulate our impressions...
@@fishlordusername891 idk, I see the simplicity as a flattening of culture and a coralling of human emotions into a few manageable categories.
It reflects the risk averse nature of multinational corporations which on one hand can be a strength, but also a contributor to keeping culture and life in general boring.
I think people should even within the market be presented with unique, more niche things that reflect the subtle differences in culture that still exist.
@@michellematthews671 oh yeah for sure.
Mascot and logo are probably more desirable than this because it’s the corporation representing ITSELF in its infographics rather than representing US. When it’s their interpretation of how we’re supposed to feel, it’s like they’re telling us HOW we’re supposed to feel. If it’s a representation of themselves, it feels more honest
holy shit imagine if someone made a horror game in corporate art style... that would be insane
BLOOBER TEAM YOU MAKE WEIRD ASS HORROR GAMES WRITE THIS DOWN
The bright cheerful colors are too happy to be in a horror game.
@@calamitychaela1994 well to be fair, it would probably rely on a lot of surrealism and derealization
@@calamitychaela1994 I mean if you think about, if something looks too cheerful or happy, it will began to look off. Kinda like those strange liminal spaces.
Ok.
this style looks like how the word "synergy" sounds
Ugh
i hate that you're right
perfect
No because Synergy is at least fun to say.
KURAPIKA IS NOW DROWNING
I absolutely love the old school flat art. They put a whole lot more into it than flat art of today. Also, the fonts in use with a lot of Art Deco art pieces add much charm to those pieces.
It's supposed to be ambiguous and I think it shows what these corporations actually think their customers look/act like: cartoonish walking bank accounts that just exist to spend money. That, and the art style looks like in belongs in a children's book. Like we're idiots or something. No wonder people hate it. It's akin to a faceless corporation that tries to say that you're family instead of a customer. Intrusive and cringe as all hell, has the exact opposite of what they want.
Agree. I also find being referred to as a "consumer" incredibly condescending. And the family thing too. It's like they don't know the meaning of the word family.
"Everything's fine" The art style. Historians will analyze it to death, that's for sure.
Maybe it will represent the 2010s equivalent of the "Everyone in the 1950s was a Stepford Smiler" trope.
more like “Everything’s fine :))” but yeah lol. It’s almost creepy how happy everyone is in them
Historians talk about "Norman Rockwell's America" representing the art of the 1950s. Well, for the 2020s, we'll have Buck's Alegria to talk about
Someone in the future will write how this was a well-dressed dystopia, and then people will realise everything still is a well-dressed dystopia because people will always ruin everything.
“everything’s fine (:”
It’s simple
Kurzgesagt = has ducks
Corporate = has no ducks
ducks good
Underrated imo
krusgesagts artstyle looks so much better and uinque tho
@@Mark-Wilson how do classy pigs oink
"uinque"
He speaks the truth
I feel like this art style has creeped into everything now and days. Everything from music to cars feels like it's made without passion
Kids cartoons. Ugh. When I babysit the grandkids and watch them, I feel my brain cells dying.
We've hit the portion of late-stage capitalism where companies are just seeking further ways of turning the human experience into new profit generating schemes. It's all about numbers on a spreadsheet now, things like culture and the arts (or making a "good" product) are just numbers to be crunched to maximize gains.
@@craigwillms61same, i know the feeling all too well
@@varahunter68 cartoons in the 60s and 70s were so much better.
*nowadays (not sure if AC or typo?)
For any book nerds: This art style reminds me of the planet Camazotz from A Wrinkle in Time. Just unsettlingly perfect, to the point where you know something’s wrong.
corporate art feels like it just spawns. like i can’t imagine an artist sitting down and drawing this lol
It's like they have a bunch of basic templates then use an AI to mix n match the templates together to mass create generic advertisement art
@@Gameprojordan We'll get there too
I think you art critics have no understanding of anything, hence the lack of imagination. You don't realize if someone actually sat down and spent 48 hours coaxing a visual masterpiece out of Illustrator to adorn a page that most viewers scroll past in less than 1 second it would not be appreciated, in fact it would be ridiculed even worse. It's trying too hard. Do you want to navigate a lengthy Shakepearian diatribe when you try to find information about your latest medical worry online? This is just visual communication, it's not trying to be art. It succeeds at giving people a vague feeling but if you sit and think about it that's missing the point entirely so of course you'll be disappointed.
Yea to me it just feels fake like it’s somehow like made in some sort of factory like how those cheap toys from the dollar store are made or something like that
@@gorkyd7912 this is a pretty nice take ngl
This art reminds me of how the airport smells
Why is this so accurate
I hate how much I can agree with this despite never having been to an airport since I was too young to remember.
You mean smells like fake and plastic? Cause that’s what an airport smells like to me
Is bad or good?
honestly i like the smell of airports
I believe it's not about the art anymore... It can be a flat cartoon, a 3D animation, or real actors, what is annoying us is publicity EVERYWHERE all the time!
I agree with you, sometimes would be more nice to just have a text, maybe a single picture.
Other than that, personally, I think what bothers most people is the type of ads.
A lot of ads like the grubhub one are annoying and make the audience feel like complete idiots with catchy tunes and cringey acting/animation. I often find myself watching old ads out of nostalgia and most don't give me this feeling :(
Yes, maybe this is what changed... Ads used to be glamorous, but people complained because, apparently, it was some sort of lie. Now all ads feel the need to be loudly positive and cheerful.
Here in the middle of the US, there's a grocery store chain called Kroger. They use this art style in their commercials, and I remember seeing it (a hundred different times) and just hating it. I've noticed this in many different places, and your analysis of it is spot on.
Kroger also owns Fred Meyer on the west coast, so we haven’t escaped them either.
They own fry’s too, and holy cow they have so many commercials on TH-cam i
This art style be like:
Tiny head, 9ft and and giant arms and legs
Only animals look good
Google be like
AZAN PogO?
9ft eh?
*it reminds me of some lady ;*
Tarsila do Amaral's Abaporu did it before it was cool
So in essence. Soulless artwork intended to tick off the least amount of people possible. Characters that represent everyone and no one at the same time.
pretty much...
Exactly how a corporation sees us. Minds to manipulate for sales or networking. Minds they just need to convince to keep looking :(
@@hydroxyl5130 does it not fascinate you though? How business can use our psychology against us in order for their gain. Why not use it for your own business. I find this video very interesting as i too wondered why they use that shitty art style. Now I know it’s just another business tactic made up by some of the most brilliant minds on our planet. Evil or not it’s brilliant
Weird because for me it did the exact opposite XD. I want to physically murder these fictional characters with my bare hands.
@@MrEkirt Its definitely smart and I guess you could call it brilliant but it soulless and uncreative. Sure it makes the money but who cares when it it can be qualified as basic art that almost anyone could make. Nothing wrong with admiring the logic behind it all but I cant personally admire it when we live in such a capitalistic world that's filled with so many things like this. I just don't see anything to admire about rich fucks hiring very smart people to pinch every penny they can get there hands on.
4:19 I'm just surprised how the older icons look considerably more pleasing to the eye (or in some cases more readable and/or quickly identifiable - the things you want as an app icon).
Funny, I find these human blobs actually pretty offensive. As in "this is absolutely every single one of you guys: overweight, silly people with a very, veeeery small head, always running or taking selfies". Revolting. Hated it at first sight.
This art direction always rubs off on me as "I'm not like the other companies. Look at me I'm quirky and awkward too!"
I agree....but look at me! Im quirky and awkward too..... Soooob!
This might just be a reflection of my widespread distrust & paranoia but I feel as though it also represents “simplicity for the simple-minded”. It mocks us as being smooth-brained individuals who require the entertainment & services these corporations provide to get by day to day. We can’t think or do for ourselves so we’re simpletons to them
Same, and by all these companies copying this stupid art style, that entire idea is basically obsolete now. You can't be quirky and awkward and different if everyone is doing it.
yoo LMAOOOOO
How though? Its an art style not everything is trying to be quirky. I think they are just using it because its more cost efficient or something.
Remember that spongebob episode when he tries to become “normal”? That’s exactly what this art style reminds me of.
Hey, how are ya?
Hey, how are ya?
Hey, how are ya?
Hey, how are ya!
Nice weather we’re having 🙂
This sums it up really well! For a while, I have mockingly called it "Corporate Clean Flat™" where you can see websites, character design, coloration, etc... all feeling the same. It felt boring, thoughtless and lazy. Yet I couldn't put my finger on why they seemed that way for the longest time as like you said: They aren't inherently a bad style. I just knew something seemed off even though traits of them have been seen in far better art pieces throughout history. Then one day it hit me: It's not relatable. Like you pointed about that the illustrated people not really existing, they fail to capture what things are. There have been plenty of characters throughout history with exaggerated body proportions/movements and non-human colors, but they felt alive because of their relatability to each scenario. You aren't getting that when on stuff like seeing a bunch of people happily jumping for joy at a bug fix that took them 4 months to get to or something. People reading that announcement would be more like: "Oh... Took you long enough."
It kinda reminds me of clip-art from Microsoft office. A lot of the images in them had this 90s minimalist cubist look to them. I think that association with office software has also reinforced its sterile, corporate feel. And with clip-art in mind, it can feel lazy and fake. Typically when I see clip-art, I'm aware that the picture wasn't actually made for the document, but is instead a kind of stock image that was included with the software, or grabbed from Google images.
The corporate art version of "Saturn Devouring His Son" is fucking hilarious.
Joshua Brinton Autry why do I keep reading comments right before it happens in the video
I hate it so much AAAAGHH I CAN'T STOP THINKING ABOUT IT IT'S BAD IT'S JUST SO FRICKING BAD
if you think that's funny wait 'till you've seen the flat art floyd or hitler or jews. good stufd
It really shows the lack of emotional depth that corporate art has
Week
I get the feeling that this art style is trying so hard to be inoffensive.
inoffensive, cheap and uninspiring.
ah yes, the free market
Isn't that a good thing?
Edit: would you rather see a semi racist illustration in a website or a boring gray character?
@@onionskin3254 by trying to please everyone you please no one
@@4nd3rzzon that's the whole point. It's bland enough so people don't care. It's not gonna please anyone but more importantly for those companies, it's not gonna generate any hard rejections. Minimal annoyance at worse. So they're free to continue to use this trend as long as they want, since it's just an "innofensive space filler"
@@onionskin3254 no
I think it represents the androgynous life that the world is headed toward. Everyone needs to agree. Everyone needs to like or dislike something. Everything has to be combined to please everyone. If they make you faceless or generic, you have no identity and can be shaped into whatever society wants you to be. No original thoughts? That means you can't disagree. No identity outside of what society says makes up one's identity. They don't want you to be an individual. "If everyone's special, no one will be."- Syndrome and (loosely) Dash
You, you just made the Best comment of this video in my opinion. Congratulations 👏🏻💯🌟...
@@MiguelMedV Preciate it!😊
In other words the new world order
When I read androgynous, I thought you meant gender androgynous and got excited for a second.
@@callmemackeroniYou're EXACTLY the kind of person he was talking about.
Enjoy your miserable future.
I swear seeing this art style gives me a migraine its too simple seeing 2000s Shiny art style just looks refreshing and nice.
Yeah
Yes.
@@MariusKennedy Fumo
@@VOMITK0 Kept you waiting huh?
two words: "insidiously friendly"
Oh god yes it matches the feel too well
Yeah, like siren song pulling sailors into a watery grave.
Forcibly Friendly Nanny Approved
Couldn't have said it better
How do you do fellow multicultural offensive audience?
I think my teacher said it best, "If you try to make something that everyone likes, you'll lose what makes it special"
Well said
They are right.
Meh, if you manage to make something that resonates with a lot of people, I'd say it's pretty special.
@@feeno1188 yeah but this resonates with nobody
@@gell2277 yeah no one likes it, it's an all around failure
Making a movie with this artstyle is like writing a book with comic sans.
Why? Because:
A) It's entirely 2d while we live in 3d universe. 2d animation is considered primitive for a reason.
B) It uses unnatural skin colors like Blue and Purple that our brain associates with suffocation, asphyxiation and distress.
C) It ignores or flat out distorts the features our gaze is drawn towards the most- eyes, lips, hips, shoulders, butt, etc. Instead, it wants us to see the fellow human as nothing more than a gender-neutral skinsuit.
D) Once you factor in the flappy, jointless appendages, it really looks like you are seeing a bunch of dyed, flayed skins set on display by some twisted serial killer !!🤯
E) The simultaneous adoption of this ugly artstyle by tech companies triggers people who already distrust these companies. And we do have reasons to not trust them...
It's not often I feel I read something intelligent and insightful in a comment section. Thankyou.
God I hate this art style. It feels so devoid of any personality I can't stand it. There's no uniqueness in the people drawn, there's no personality, no real emotions. Art made with no soul that feels like brain washing material..
For me it feels like it's trying to fake a personality
They should rename it from "alegria" to "crippling depression".
You're right because this art is used by fake nice wannabes
Reminds me of Illumination..
So yeah, that's about right.
a lot of flat art looks so much better than the corporate art styles
As an artist myself, i dont hate the art style at all. I just hate what it represents. Every time I see it I think of other artists switching to the style to make a client happy.
right! its not even bad aesthetic wise and kind of fun, but seeing it everywhere makes me sad that companies wont make themselves stand out
To be honest though, if you were working for a heartless corporate entity, would you really be down for putting your own heart and soul into it, or even any effort so not to waste any "good" art on some business?
I feel this so much. When I was in college, one of my second year seniors had a very unique art style and I loved it. Since some of the 4th year seniors were getting more and more success with this Corporate Memphis style, he gradually started changing his style to look like theirs. Nowadays, there's like 5 illustrator friends I can't recognize their art because it looks the same.
@@greenetomphson6164 not at all 😔 that's why i say that this art style just makes me sad because i get where it's coming from. Like we all have to make ends meet but it's still just so soul crushing 😔
I've done a lot of stints making logos and brand identities since thats where the clients are and sometimes you just go on autopilot
I don't hate the artstyle, but the way it's used is terrible. I don't like it though. As someone who loves digital art, I don't want to work with a big company, because it's just limiting.
As someone who likes minimalism, I actually don't hate the design themselves, I hate the fact it's used EVERYWHERE. They're also "dumbing down" the logos more than they are simplifying it.
Look at the old internet explorer logos. They had detail in them if you looked closely, but the main logo could be drawn by a child and you'd still know what it is. *_That's minimalism done right._* Minimalism doesn't mean "saturate the colors and remove any depth or detail."
As a designer, I have always seen this overused style as ‘Clip Art’ was before the internet. It cheapens any brand and your trenchant critique is spot on! I would rather look at the cheesy stock images before this style was adopted. Besides the body forms on all these are strange, because the use of these stock illustrated humanz would never be considered surreal.
The Grubhub Commercials literally look like those advertisements for bottled oxygen in the Lorax.
Exactly this, it looked so "Illumination". Meaning: soulles, and cashgrabby.
lmao you’re actually right
grubhub's gonna need a burn heal after that one lmao
abhahahah
AAAAAA
I don’t know why, but the phrase,”Grubhub lore” absolutely killed me
In the beginning there was the word and the word was Grub. And Grub made the Hub. For millennium the Kings of Grub ruled over their Hub. In the following centuries the Grub Hub empire rose to power, their might surpassing the thousands of others who dared to concour the mighty Hub of Grub.
Okay but please don’t say “The hub” Bc that has been ruined for me by ppl calling P-hub “the hub” lol
@@elektra81516 In the beginning there was nothing, and before nothing there was GrubHub
Globglogabgalab.
@@luciendelaney8975 boi shut up 😂
It just feels like that person that critisize you if you don't see superficilly happy
I feel like the art style is the corporations telling me “everything, is as it should be :)” while they gain dirty money
They’re trying to act down to earth and “hip” as they avoid taxes and bust unions
Everything is as it should be
I saw this before
It's really just like those propaganda posters but instead of blatantly demanding for your obedience they gain your trust by hiding the "Freedom is Slavery" slogan behind a fake smile
Yes! And all the comments here so far remind me of the song "Brave New World" by Kalandra... It is an extremely important red flag we must NOT ignore! Do not allow yourselves to be controlled by the Morning Star!!
"Successful hills are here to stay
Everything must be this way
Gentle streets where people play
Welcome to the Soft Parade
All our lives we sweat and save
Building for a shallow grave
Must be something else we say
Somehow to defend this place
Everything must be this way
Everything must be this way, yeah"
The Soft Parade, The Doors
I've started realizing how weird it is, it just feels like the company is trying to be relatable but it feels like it was made by some algorithm programmed to churn out happy and diverse noodle people. There's no humanity.
us 7ft purple pinheaded folk need representation too.
Never was, never will
yup, it feels like the kind of thing a machine would churn out. sterile and inhuman.
That sounds... kind of sad, really.
@@NGRevenant sounds like you’re referring to Pink Floyd’s:The Machine which is a perfect fit even decades after it was released. We are all just cogs in the system & if we stop working, we’ll be discarded & replaced
Great video / analysis!
From a technical pov: this art style is due it's simplicity a good alternative specially for smaller businesses to tell stories (e. g. for campaigns, newsletters, new products) without spending a lot of money on A. complex illustrations (for every new campaign or newsletter) which are not reusable B. a photoshooting. That's why it's pretty widely used. Clients also often lack on imagination or need some sort of confirmation/safety net. It's way more difficult if not even impossible to introduce an art style which is not common and unique because a client - who's not design affine - needs a proof of concept if you will. Round shapes are also linked to humane/safe/trust/freedom in design language, combined with desaturated colors, you achieve a humane look by the book. The shapes of the people have to be abstract so that a wider range of people can relate to it. Imagine the people would have concrete proportion or would be skinny vs. thick / small vs. large = you would add meanings to them unconsciously. The long legs and arms also help show actions/tasks more clearly, and therefore it's easier to tell stories (that's why the art style is often used to describe a process e. g. a login or registration process too). Due to its simplicity, it's also great to create scenes fast. Like you said in your video, deadlines are always short.
The question of »How do we tell stories?« photos or illustrations? Is a common question when developing brands. It's mostly dependent on the brand itself. E. g. if you're a small business and don't have an office OR if you're and big business international business with many people, it's hard to show humanity through photos without being too generic (which we all also hate, right? Think of all the generic stock photos).
That art style pretty much makes the image invisible to me. I've seen so much of the same thing that I guess I just naturally skim over it.
The corporate art style feels like suffocatingly happy , like it’s smiling while holding a gun to your head and telling you to be happy , kinda unnerving man . But some of this feeling can be attributed towards hate against big corp. The illustrators really need to get paid properly man , their job feels undervalued .
That ugly souless art is just forced feminism and political propaganda.
as a kid I felt this fake happiness in ads strongly , so whenever ad of this kind showed up I'd make fun of it in my head
The problem is this art style is overused. Familiarity brings contempt. A few tech companies including Facebook started with it, and soon everyone else followed suit like a herd of animals.
It's like that UI design trend 5 years ago which shifted from square profile pictures to circular ones, rounded bars & buttons, and minimalist website display (which actually made it harder to navigate & read when done improperly).
It’s just a commercial
Heh i did use hyperbole quite a bit didnt I ,?
I honestly find those tiny-headed blocky-body noodle limb people from the corporate art style to be vaguely unnerving to look at. The tiny heads and long large limbs gives me the impression that they're ridiculously tall. I can't help but imagine them as creatures from a horror movie or game. Imagine one of those things steadily pursuing you down a dark hallway.
or maybe don't imagine them at all if you want to sleep tonight
I commented this but it remembers me of a painting called Abapuru by Tarsila Do Amaral. The person in the painting has very big limbs in comparison to it's head, because they need to work much more than they think. I think corporations kinda send that message of with this artstyle.
There's definitely some kind of uncanny thing going on with them. Strange when they're supposed to be meant to be as bland and non-objectionable as possible. Stick figures would honestly work better.
They look like the Goombas from the live action Super Mario Bros movie.
They didn't watch the Super Mario Super Show and got turned into goombas
as someone who is planning to major in graphic design, this is good info to help me understand what i may be getting into, great video!
basically we need frugiter aero back
The grubhub ad looks like a future illumination film
GrubHub Cinematic Universe when?
I'm pretty sure it was made by illumination
It is. Has the same level of substance.
Grubhub: Revenge of the Chicken Sandwich
Never coming to a theater near you
Yes, yes it does
It's an art style that looks like it has something to say, but is also carefully crafted to say absolutely nothing on its own.
wow nicely put!
Genius
very accurate. Also its nice exactly because of this haha
they serve the same purpose as stock photos. when they would be to exact it would be immensely harder to find the right one for your purpose 😅
interface designer here, sry for being lazy sometimes. they are just quick hahah
It's like fucking dada but without the artistic integrity. x.x
@@arsarma1808 Nah this is like the opposite of dada
I'm sort of inspired to try and recreate scenes of war and death in Alegria now
i literally got an ad with that art style right after i saw this 😂😂😂😂 it’s so common wtf
At my art school we coined the term “bendy people” cause of their noodle arms
The arms are the most unsettling part tbh
Can confirm. We called them noodlemen/noodlewomen.
@@gaijingojira3601 Yeah, those arms are freaky
@Hunter Ansorge bruh stfu
@Hunter Ansorge is it racist to describe a cat as fluffy, then?
That art style is so devoid of any personality or life that it's actually a little scary...
i guess that explains why old spice commercials are still remembered.
personality
@@DarkSymphony777 that's something that should be noted. There is nothing personal about this style, it's used every where and doesn't really connect to us. Like as a business I'd want to be sperate from others, you don't see this style and think of one company, you think all of them.
They call it globohomo for a reason.
That's just life.
@@computeraidedworld1148 that's what discord used to be. Back in the day, they used to be edgy and really cool, while looking a bit incompetent (you know, that "we, at Discord, take our work seriosly" while making a completely crackhead ads - thing) they were really personal. And as they grown up, (ironically, they grew up in both ways, they became bigger and more serious) they became more corporate and clean, losing their personality. I mean, I really like that Discord now not only a gamer thing (even though I joined discord back then only because it was a place where gamers can talk to eachother about some particular games) and now basically for everyone, but because they try to appeal to every audience, they lost a good part of their personality
I worked at Amazon for a “seasonal shift” and it was the most dystopian thing ever. A lot of art like this is used in advertisements or training videos. I hated working there it’s the epitome of corporate and the job is mindless robotic work.
This is interesting because I was just hired to make a set clipart for a large corporate and they wanted something generic but inclusive. They don’t want expressions. They want to have characters that can be pulled out by the designers, so they can mix and match to be able to repeatedly use them in different campaigns.
It’s really hard to make something unique and feel alive when you are task with something so generic and with so much restriction.
The art you like are made for that one single purpose, so the composition and the characters works well in a single piece because it’s meant for just that one piece. Clipart like the ones used in the corporate world are meant to be recycled sadly.
These art styles are supposed to gain the consumer's trust but whenever I see them I think, "They are going to sell my data."
That was beautifully said
@King of The Zinger the chance is probably like 1 in 100 000. I dont think you actually have worked in food. People will thaw roasts on the counter as a practice, for 30 years, and noone will get sick.
Fool. They already sold your data.
@King of The Zinger FATALITY!
Artstyle: Tasteless, soulless, mimicking humans, without any tone, culture or character or gender; exactly how companies sees and treats us.
You can see that these globohomo corporations think we consumers are all braindead children on intellectual life support, which ironically seems to be the case more or less.
@@ollikoskiniemi6221 Exactly. And the supporters, the Apple-only, no-brain, macchiato latte drinking types, has also infiltrated the art app community, with their low-effort, vector-only, talentless globohomo art, which is basically mirroring themselves. At least now I understand my hate for it.
@@MetalArrow Art and architechture should be created in ways that survive the changing tides, trends and narratives. They should be timeless. That's why classic, neoclassic and romantic styles of art are the best.
@@ollikoskiniemi6221 Funny thing I noticed, for a movie as old as Sleeping Beauty '59. Style, animation and especially backgrounds are so exceptionally well made by TODAYS standard, it's enough to put most modern productions to shame (if they had any that is)
Yay
7:46 I love how horribly spelled Kurzgesagt was. The video was going pretty serious and in a single tone until that point. Thanks for making me smile in such a way
I think something that differentiates Corporate Memphis from other minimalistic or geometric artstyles (see Bauhaus, Art Déco etc...) is the knowledge and experience artists have. For example, it is clear that the artists shown with a more original style have a different base or experience compared to the ones who just make humanoids with weird proportions and noodles arms, proof is how they use colors and shapes.
We don't hate this art style just because it's bad, we hate it because of what it represents
Amen.
i hate it cus its bad much more
Based
It's a pavlovian response at this point
Both things actually.
It looks like a bootleg version of “cloudy with a chance of meatballs” and you can’t convince me otherwise
yes!!!
I think it looks like it was produced by Illumination Entertainment, which has some irony to it given that Illumination is also notorious for using similar cheap vector art styles, marketing itself like it's first-decade Pixar even though the stories for its films are nothing more than pablum tripe for the mush-brained masses, demonstrably watering down the spirit of the third-party stories they've adapted, and prostituting itself to any and every corporate entity that will pay them to do the bulk lifting for advertising.
@@DaMaster012 the first despicable me was good, but that was before they learned they didn't have to try.
@@GlitchBunn I agree. The first Despicable Me was very good, in fact. It was simple, bordering on cloche even, but it was hearty, and the portrayal of a good father figure to be commended, especially considering how much they're condemned and mocked nowadays. Unfortunately, they send to have taken the wrong message from being successful with a sweet but safe feature and leaned fully into pandering to the absolute lowest common denominator; the kinds of dullards like the people who harrassed Dave Chappelle by constantly yelling "I'm Rich James, bitch!" at him, without realizing why the sketch was funny or appreciating his more intelligent (and in my opinion funnier) sketches, like the one of the blind klansman who doesn't know he's black.
It's said that a fool and their money are soon parted, and Illumination built their entire business on depriving dumbasses of their dollars.
No it looks like the perverted hotdog movie.
Wow good on you for this. That makes sense. I knew I wasn’t going crazy. I noticed that for a long time
Samsung does this too. I recently upgraded to an A53 phone and several of the stock apps have this style shoehorned into it, like it really needed to be there for some reason. I don't think the stock sms app even needed art in it to begin with.
It always baffles me how minimalism is seen as a "modern" and progressive, when it is something that was in my opinion perfected in graphic design and art half a century ago, if not even longer than that. Instead modern minimal graphic design has taken all of the art and nuance out of design, and created something simplistic rather than simple.
Simplicity is so fucking mediocre i cant stand it. They think its creative when any half wit can easily come up with something as simple bland and mundane as this. The more i see this art style the more i get infuriated with it.
Remember that you’re seeing survivorship bias. Today you see thousands of designed things, but you only see a few remaining pieces from a hundred years ago. It’s possible that the best of today is just as good (or better) as the best of yesterday.
@@zachpw @Zach Wiggin I suppose so. That is interesting to consider. Of course there is plenty of art and design from the past century that I don't personally deem as very good or effective, and modern art and design that I think is great. We'll have to just wait and see what sticks, I guess. As always hindsight is 20/20. Graphic design as a profession is also very oversaturated and a lot easier than it used to be before the digital/internet era, meaning we get to see a lot more mediocre and mundane graphic design on a daily basis, which might misconstrue the very good design which might be buried somewhere in between.
@2freeIvX I agree! I’ve seen many great uses of minimalism in modern design also. Some of my favourites include Hiroshi Nagai and Ryan Carl. Of course a lot of it also comes down to personal preference and shouldn’t be generalized to all art and design. Im just not personally big on many modern styles and trends of flat design I’ve seen on instagram, etc. though i really like art by Cassandre, Fontana, Stella, the Bauhaus movement... Each to their own!
Trends just go in cycles, they never actually come up with something new.
Fashion is a dead industry that can't produce much of interest anymore, since it's all been done at least once by at least someone. (Aesthetically speaking)
That is the disadvantage it suffers due to being progressed consistently for over 5,000 years, globally.
All they can do is advance the technological aspects.
I thought I was the only one having this feeling. I felt like the art is so smug but at the same time soulless. It's very hard to describe
and it's so easily forgettable. like once I'm not looking directly at it I forget everything about it, even if I'm thinking about it. it also feels condescending and insulting.
What’s the name of your anime pfp?
@@christmasgrinch4017 its a v tuber avatar
Pikamee Ch. th-cam.com/channels/ajhBT4nMrg3DLS-bLL2RCg.html
that it looks so dumb they look stupid and isnt even a talent
Great video, I loved it! So much details, and so many great recommendations ❤
Is ironical how dinamic those compositions are, but makes them feel unemotionally
I've hated this style for as long as I can remember. I read it as soooo fucking condescending. Like we're all four years old laughing and clapping at colors and silly, faceless shapes. I'm fucking over it. Thank yo for this.
Bingo. Condescending and infantilizing
faceless shapes that look like an algorithm came up with
Exactly this. We are now increasingly having online click through trainings in this style at work
It’s all love and peace in the pics but they’ll fuck us all for an extra dollar.
My thoughts exactly
This trend, feels like a font. A baseline that everyone can use just to get a point across, without truly expressing much of anything besides the message.
That's really poetic this comment is gonna be a big boy remember me
Comic Sans
Thank you for sharing the real answer. Everyone else in these comments are like “I think the art is soulless because our brains associate it with the soulless corporations!” Lol like c’mon y’all life is not a Disney movie
webartdings
Yea honestly soul and originality is overrated. Not everyone can make "groundbreaking" aesthetics because of many reasons. It can argued to be classist as well because artistic visuals mostly came from people who either can afford art school, or born with the brain capacity to combine theories, aesthetics, social awareness, to make somethig that wows.
I don't know, but I always loved flat corporate art. There's was something so optimistic and picturesque about it that was pleasing to my eyes.
oh no! they've taken your soul
i kid of course, i can see why its appealing to some, though personally it feels like im being aggressively lied to, like they are trying to make me forget about some heinous crime with silly shapes and colors
and I get a fucking TH-cam poll ad before this.
When you said “there’s “lore?!?” I genuinely laughed out loud
Me too. It's so absurd.
I was mind blown
Omg ikr like *w h y*
when
I loled
This art-style makes me think of "There is no war in Ba-Sing Se".
lol. i liked that thanks
Exactly
the earth king has invited you to Lake Laogai
@@francescolombardi3438 I am honored to accept his Allegra-themed invitation
I've never read a description that is so accurate!
This artstyle has one huge perk, it's prob the easiest Vektor Animation base you can think of. People love moving stuff on websites and even as a beginner you can make some professional looking animations, which tbh, most of the animations for big companies get done by unpaid interns anyway, so it's super convenient for them to use them.
The disproportionate limbs creeps me out honestly
Louis Armstrong once said “you don’t become an artist because you want to, you become one because you can’t not.” Art has always been for expression, while profit can be made, it’s intent is to communicate - art in this style reflects the profit based intentions rather then expression - it’s the intent and connectivity art provided that it lacks - it’s truly something that is noticeable - appeal, low communication and mediocre expression does not grasp many , it’s honestly weird to look at
i really like that quote, thanks for sharing
@@stuckfart Yeah, same here.
Hard to find the sauce, but damn if it isn't a really good quote.
THIS QUOTE HAS BEEN PASSED DOWN THE ARMSTRONG FAMILY LINE FOR GENERATIONS!
This could explain why corporate music sounds so soulless.
Its insincere sincerity. This may be anecdotal, but I feel as if graphic design has never been so similar between each brand. Not only does every company looks the same, but sound the same. All I hear is "peace of mind" and "family" and "community". It doesn't feel like they just wanna sell me something anymore. And for something which is supposedly a capitalist endeavor, that isn't a good sign.
Same feel as every ad on the planet going _"In these uncertain times"_ over soft music in the past year or so...
And I feel like it’s toxic in a way because it’s not spreading new art styles it’s so generic. I think they would stand out more if they had their own style and that could help new art be circulated too.
I'm an designer/illustrator and from my perspective, I enjoy that it's all so homogenous since the brand image doesn't get in the way of usability. I frankly don't give a shit whether a company is unique or cool or whatever, because that is not the reason I use their services. Art, like actual art, which is created with the intent of expressing oneself, has no place in places like UI and brand image. The illustrations in corporate designs are instrumental, they are there for a specific practical reason, not to be an artistic expression.
I wish people judged companies solely on the quality of their services and not on the coolness factor. I don't use a single service because I think it 'looks cool'.
@@quatricise Yeah, but if it can't look good, then why waste the screen space on it?
"And for something which is supposedly a capitalist endeavor..."
For real. Am I buying a product, or industrialized therapy?
Corporate graphic designers be like
Ctrl+c
Ctrl+v
"Hhhhmmmmm yes the consoomers will love this"
I remember I came across this ad using the corporate artstyle and they credited the artist, and I went to go look at their page on insta and I saw that, while they did draw humans like corporate memphis typically does, in their works that weren't for ads, their drawings looked alot more, I don't know how to put it, less corporate, less artificial and more alive and appealing I guess, I distinctly remember this one post they did that had a lady with glasses holding a cat I think, and had like a green color pallete too, sadly I don't remember the name of the artist so that sucks because it was some really nice art
I hope these big companies never change their art styles. They're still just doing it for money, and so getting them to change their art style will only get other companies to use that style over and over again and ruin that as well. The boring, lifeless, soulless corporate artwork we have right now perfectly illustrates what the company is probably all about