Imagine the uproar if maths teaching stopped at 14. If you never stepped into a science lab again at that age. If English lessons vanished just before GCSEs. That’s exactly what has happened to art in our schools. A curriculum focused on testing core subjects means state schools have little choice but to teach the subjects they’re measured – and judged – on, at the expense of everything else.
This is the background to the campaign we directed and wrote for the Royal Academy of Arts (RA), that ran on billboards across London and on social at the end of 2024.
The campaign stemmed from a bigger conversation about the RA’s brand and voice. The RA had been thinking about their brand and what they want to be known for. And they found the things they’re most proud of – they’re independently run by artists, for artists – were getting lost.
Some of that was to do with their writing. They’d put on a ground-breaking exhibition about art’s links to empire and slavery (which also featured Hew Locke), but gave it a title that wouldn’t sound out of place on a PhD thesis: ‘Entangled Pasts, 1768-now.’
As a general election in the UK loomed, we talked to them about trying something different: an awareness campaign to kickstart debate about art in education. This was a first for the RA – they had never created a standalone brand campaign without links to an exhibition or their arts programming. Which, in turn, gave them a chance to get their independent spirit across in the tone.
It was a leap of faith for the Royal Academy. Most art institutions have an aversion to sharing an opinion or even using ‘we’ at the start of a sentence. But, to their credit, they went for it and the reactions to their sparky, more forthright tone spoke volumes. Content was seen 2.04 million times on social (283% above average benchmark /AAB); it received 63.3k likes on social (527% AAB); 5.9k saves on social (839% AAB); 3.3k comments on social (619% AAB), as well starting conversations with ministers and other organisations.
The RA even created tote bags and badges to sell in their shop to support the ‘art is a serious subject’ campaign. We knew the campaign was working when our local secondary school posted it on their stories and asked for posters to put up in their art rooms. Teachers were behind the campaign, too. It proved what we and the RA knew all along – art is a serious subject.
WHAT WE DID
+ Managed the tone and direction of the campaign.
+ Researched the ideas and developed a bunch of stories.
+ Wrote the final ads.
WHAT WE DIDN’T
+ The design – the RA’s in-house team did that.
+ Take the photos – that was Laurence Howe / Lightfoot Agency.