A Lifestyle that Created a Brand

 Or, the lifestyle that launched a million brands. Party photography has created commercial opportunities through creatively using collective intelligence, produsage and transmedia storytelling.

Ever since since such articles as 'Hipster: The Dead End of Western Civilization' and it’s counterparts, in works such as Timeout New York and Vice, published within recent years, ever since Gavin McInnes founded Streetboners and TV Carnage, following the hugely successful Vice 'Dos and Don'ts', a lifestyle was born, one without an ideology, one which ‘refuses to aknowledge itself’. This lifestyle has been ridiculed, debased, even claimed to be dead, though whatever came from this movement of paradoxical self-absorbed non-identity, was a genius way to profit commercially. The idea of selling people what they themselves have created is baffling yet has probably launched some of the most successful campaigns this decade.

The nonchalant party lifestyle, captured at just the right ‘photo-op’ moment in time by Mark ‘The Cobra Snake’ Hunter, surprised millions by becoming incredibly lucrative, while emitting an ethos of spontenaity and of a DIY approach to his work.

            Visiting his website, welcomes one into a world of fantasy, where the only thing worth documenting is a good party or a worthwhile connection. From here, a clothing line has been launched, which touches on transmedia storytelling: The items for sale reflect the actions taken place at the events documented and to click purchase is to feel like part of the event.

            Produsage enters here at the door of the event, as browsers of this site fantasize of taking part, attend hosted events themselves, or attend similarly themed events which advertise a quick appearance made by the photographer himself. And so the guests take part in the creation of the product itself, fuelling it further.

            And from this, people, the viewers, the consumers, the attendees, went on to create more of the same, Last Nights Party is a website hosting a mini-series, documenting nights out in New York, spent partying and pondering, the type of thought inspired by the previously mentioned photography: A lifestyle documented equals a lifestyle advertised. Also available here are hundreds of photos, similar to those posted on the CobraSnake website, featuring, but most importantly not staring celebrities, whom lend a hand to the DIY feel of the published works, creating a sense of ‘being part of something’. And now, the consumer is hooked. Henry Jenkins’ ‘Additive comprehension’ can be applied here, as more layers of information have been planted in the story of the lifestyle, the story of each character.

            This is transmedia storytelling literally splayed across traditional media: Photographs, videos and sound bites of attendees will be published on television, radio, magazines and most importantly the internet. The photographer himself, as well as the celebrities featured and also the non-celebrities who through association become internet stars are all part and parcel of a media machine that is fuelled by exactly repeating these instances over, to create a story and creating ‘characters’ which these people have become, in order for their careers to continue, as Henry Jenkins put it: ‘if it doesn’t spread, it’s dead’. Others fuelling the machine are Gavin McInnes, Ryan McGinley, Hedi Slimane who all photograph certain types of people, giving each of these characters another layer to their story. Another story, another lifestyle, lots of branding.

            Each character at the party can be looked into further also, creating the ‘every-brand’ as there is a character for everyone, this is similar to the traditional transmedia storytelling feature of having many access points for consumers, namely the example of creating Spiderman colouring books for children, action comics for men and Mary-Jane centered comics for women. Another aspect of collective intelligence at play here is the application of blogs, namely Tumblr, Flickr and Blogspot in the spreading of photographs: free advertising for the attendees, for the brands that dressed them and for the drinks they consumed or posed with in photographs. Tumblr, to begin, is rife with ‘reblogs’, an addictive hobby, taken up by millions at absolutely no cost to the company owners, instant produsage. Add advertising to the websites themselves upon which people freely reblog and instantly there is a commercial aspect at work.

            Not hugely dissimilarly to fanfiction, in which fans continue unfinished story lines to their own satisfaction, fans of photographic websites can go on to post their own similar photographs, freely going about advertising all of the brands that they wear to their friends, absent-mindedly or not,  as well as founding their own mini-brands, to be hosted on websites such as eBay, fuelling further online advertising which appears along website borders and also compiling lists of the purchases they have made on websites such as Lookbook.nu.

            Lookbook is an invite-only website, which creates a sense of exclusivity, instantly attractive to the browser. Members upload photographs of themselves in outfits creatively compiled in attractive settings. The Members wish to be voted highly and so present the clothing in the most attractive manner possible, advertising their own lifestyle which has been heavily influenced by the clothing company directors.

            All of the elements mentioned so far: photography, branding, celebrity, music videos etc. all come to one conglomerate melding point at festivals such as Coachella, where all aspects are at the forefront of the ticket holders to do list, or possibly, commercially affected mind-set. One video advertisement from the festival features a quote that sums this up is: ‘Some people think of Coachella as a religion, they take pills like it’s the body of Christ, they drink like its holy water’, this scripted line sells the festival as a lifestyle.

            In order for the lifestyle to continue, to live, there must be an ever-growing contingency of DIY seeming, underground ‘producers’ or hubs of interest, places for the inspiration to be found for the continuity of the lifestyle. Seemingly paradoxical, there must be subcultures and alternative creative outlets, for the lifestyle to be profitable.

            Lifestyles that create this brand, must contain a certain air of nonchalance,  for example in magazines such as I-D or Purple, one can see their favourite characters both in ‘candid’ party photographs, carefully created and curated by advertisers, alongside appearances by the same characters in campaigns using apathy to create a unique selling buzz. One example here is the participation of couple, Jethro Cave and Sophie Willing in an advertising campaign for Closed, a clothing brand. The couple feature in a video advertisement on the brands website, in which both models speaks apathetically about themselves, casually dismissing the importance of ‘modern fashion’, in order to create a sense of ambiguity, of a ‘detachment’ from the brand that hints at a lifestyle which is desirable. The emphasis is not on the brand but about their own creative endeavours. Both of these people are characters. They both are models, and will continue to feature in campaigns in the same detached way as in the Closed campaign, the same way that couples will appear in campaigns for The Kooples, lavishing the viewer with stories or how they met, never mentioning the brand at hand, though always looking good in the clothes they have been directed to wear and for Oliver Peoples, where Devendra Banhart, a well-loved indie musician lackadasically spends time with his girlfriend in a non-stylized home-video type advertisement for eyewear.

             From this, one can deduce that the influence of party photography as subtle branding has been successful. It has played an important part in the creation of a genre of advertising, lending to a lifestyle which fuels many brands now associated with it. Party photography, merchandise, events, videos, familiarity, related brands, huge commercial success have ultimately lead to a lifestyle that created a brand, for everyone, exclusively, through the clever implication of collective intelligence, produsage and transmedia storytelling.