I had joined in a schoolroom task to design and paint a poster. We were invited to design adverts of the kind we might see on billboards or on TV.
ALL of the other children designed posters broadcasting the benefits of a particular brand of washing up liquid or soap powder. I did not pursue such a theme. Instead, my poster proclaimed “Breath air, Eat food, Sit on chairs, Drink water”, though the comments were accompanied by suitable, descriptive pictures.
Like the ‘Sweets’ incident, even as a little boy, I never appreciated being told to react, perform or act in a routine or predictable way.
But why, in the poster example, was a little 5 year old boy viewing his world so differently? What was going through his mind? What caused him to advertise what could easily be described as the obvious or the abstract?
I do not recall the answer I gave then – but I do understand now.
I was somehow aware of the deceit and insincerity of advertising and marketing. Yes, I was stating the obvious but I must have been making the point that adverts were lies designed to sway and entice us into buying particular brands.
My advertising campaign was not so shallow. I was saying, “Well, we do need to eat, we do need to rest and we do need to survive”.
I was 4 or 5 years old at infants school! I wonder how or why I developed and related the outlook I expressed on my poster?
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