Inspiring together
In recent years, a permanent change has been visible and tangible for all. The coronavirus pandemic has not yet been overcome, war has returned to Europe with all its suffering, the summers are brown and the winters green. For many people, the feeling of living in a polycrisis has become stronger.
How can we meet these challenges and how do we respond to them as a society or a company? What can we, as Ramstein, contribute to this? We have come to the conclusion that we want to send a positive and inspiring message to the city. Using the medium we know something about: the poster.
It is ambitious to address current sensitivities in an advertising campaign without appearing arbitrary or grovelling. Psychiatrist and happiness researcher Robert Waldinger believes that happiness is about doing things that are essential to us and being in touch with people that matter to us. This is precisely the premise behind our new campaign. We want to bring different people together and make them visible. To this end, we have slightly modified our previous poster DNA. The focus is not on individuals, but on couples. People who compete with each other and who champion our city with their work. We want to show that we can only develop as a society together and that competition is enriching and inspiring.
However, we asked ourselves, will the people being portrayed participate? Are they willing to smile across the city alongside their competitor on poster pillars? How do we get the editors-in-chief of the two most important newspapers in the region to be photographed for a joint poster? What about award-winning chefs Peter Knogl and Tanja Grandits? Our concerns were completely unfounded. Yes, we were knocking at open doors. Everyone agreed immediately. The result is six posters that we will publish over the course of the year.
Agi Isaku
Best known for having helped shape Swiss nightlife culture for the past 20 years. Over the past fifteen years, he has transformed Nordstern Basel into a world-famous club and a record winner of the Swiss Nightlife Award as the best club in the country. His career has been shaped by many different challenges, encompassing different areas of modern event management, artist management and even restaurant management. In addition to Nordstern Basel, he also owns a restaurant and a boutique bar in Basel. He is also involved in a wide range of partnerships, for example with the Unlimited Show by Art Basel or with sun.set, al fresco electronic music and art.
Ines Goldbach
With a doctorate in art history, she has been the successful curator and director of Kunsthaus Baselland for ten years. At the Kunsthaus in Muttenz, she offers young and established contemporary artists an important platform through comprehensive individual and group presentations. The Kunsthaus will soon be able to move into its new headquarters in the Dreispitzhalle. The Academy of Art and Design (FHNW), the HEK (House of Electronic Arts) and Radio X have already established themselves in the Cluster for Culture. The faculties of law and economics at the Universität beider Basel are also to be included. Goldbach’s important goal is to play an active role in shaping the entire area and give the art even greater impact.
Kathrin Schärer
Born in Basel, she is a qualified drawing and crafts teacher at the Hochschule für Gestaltung Basel and works as a freelance illustrator. Kathrin Schärer has repeatedly illustrated her own texts, as well as stories by Lorenz Pauli and Franz Hohler over many years of collaboration and with great success. She was nominated for the Hans Christian Andersen Prize 2012 and the Astrid Lindgren Award 2014 for her work as a whole. She has already been awarded the Swiss Children’s and Young People’s Media Prize twice.
Katja Reichenstein
A Katja of all trades: enabler of various cultural forms and productions, communicator, radio journalist, presenter, speaker, cultural worker, shiatsu therapist and nurse. She has a great passion for social colour and a strong commitment to the appreciation of all living creatures, plants and people on the planet. Music and movement that bring people and souls into contact are her lifeblood.
Marcel Rohr
Launched his journalistic career in 1988 with the Basel weekly newspaper Doppelstab. Between 1994 and 2005, he headed the football department of Blick and SonntagsBlick for several years. In 2005 he took over the sports desk of the Basler Zeitung, and from 2008 he also acted as editor. In December 2018, he became editor-in-chief of BaZ. Marcel Rohr is divorced and lives with journalist Eva Tedesco in Lower Fricktal.
Patrick Marcolli
Studied history and English studies in Basel while working as a freelancer for Nordschweiz and the Basler Zeitung. He then worked as cultural editor at Basler Woche, followed by 15 years at BaZ, including as head of the local section and correspondent in Berlin. From 2014 to 2018, he headed the communications department at Herzog & de Meuron. He has been editor-in-chief of bz Basel since autumn 2018.
Peter Knogl
A master of Swiss precision work. With his restaurant Cheval Blanc by Peter Knogl, the Bavarian is synonymous with classic French haute cuisine with Mediterranean and Asian influences – with a sense of style and meticulousness that makes him one of the three best chefs in Switzerland. He likes to travel to Asia, especially Japan, whose high standards and high product quality impress him very much. Back at home, he can also enjoy a sausage-and-cheese salad, one of the chef’s favourite dishes.
Petra Rappo
Lives as a freelance illustrator, book designer and artist in Basel. Her work as a book designer brought her together with writers such as Franz Dodel, Jürg Federspiel, Klaus Merz, Sigrid Zeevaert and Jutta Richter. In 2016, her book Baum an Baum (text: Lukas Lavater) was named one of the most beautiful German books by Stiftung Buchkunst. Most recently, Munich’s Carl Hanser Verlag published her children’s book Nil, Nil, ich komme! with a text by Jutta Richter. The book tells the poetic story of a small hippo that surpasses itself.
Sabine Himmelsbach
Basel has been breathing art for the Bavarian since she joined the House of Electronic Arts (HEK) as director eleven years ago. In curating, she relies on the alternation between international group and solo exhibitions, whose works have hardly been seen in Switzerland until now. Her programme focuses on socially relevant topics: the use of new technologies and their effects on society, such as virtual reality or artificial intelligence, or the effects of technologies on us humans, our emotions or our relationships.
Tanja Grandits
On the one hand, Restaurant Stucki is a restaurant that is considered to be the Olympus in Basel. On the other, Switzerland’s best chef writes cookbooks in which many of the basics of her finesse are explained in a comprehensible way. She also runs the shop Tanja Grandits für Zuhause, where everyone can buy something unusual for a small price. The easiest way is to buy her latest publication, Tanja Vegetarisch, at the bookstore and check out her collection online (given that you are sitting in front of your screen).
Thomas Keller
Managing director of Kaserne Basel and, as an Appenzeller, passionate about his adopted home of Basel. A man of culture through and through, he enjoys the city’s many cultural sites. He lives with his family in Gundeli and is often found with his son at the Joggeli (though he remains an FCSG fan at heart). Sometimes he whizzes through Basel’s old town with his alphorn on his back or blares out its sounds from the alpine hut near Gstaad.
Valentin Aschwanden
Working with his partners, he has developed Das Viertal, with its local roots, into a place of international appeal within five years. With a mix of contemporary cuisine, diverse cultural events and international clubbing, it makes for a top location. He has also been involved in night culture for 12 years with the Balz Klub, the Baltazar, the Singer Klub and the Lora. If all this becomes too much for him, he will surely recover with a glass of his own gin. His Liebling Gin.
The Klybeck area as a recording location
In our 2023 poster campaign, we show the people portrayed on our posters in a clearly urban context rather than in a studio setting, as we have done in the past. In a setting that represents the history, change and transformation of our city: the Klybeck area.
Over the next few decades, apartments for up to 8,500 people and up to 7,500 jobs are to be created in the former industrial area. This is where it will be decided what shape urban development in Basel will take. The images were complex and were taken across the 287,000-square-metre site in six different buildings. The rooms had all been dismantled and sometimes had no electricity. Fortunately, our partners included Swiss Life and Simone Meyer, who were able to solve all our difficulties and needs.
Art Direction — Ramstein Optik
Photos — Flavia Schaub
Hair and Make-up — Regula Zürrer
Location — Klybeq/Swiss Life — Simone Meyer
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