Cultural Mediations of Brands

Introduction

“Any other authority comes from another origin than nature. If one seriously considers this matter, one will always go back to one of these two sources: either the force and violence of an individual who has seized it, or the consent of those who have submitted to it by a contract made or assumed between them and the individual on whom they have bestowed authority.”

(Diderot 1995 [1751–1765])

I.1. Cultural proposals and commercial mediation

I.1.1. A strange mediation

Rodin’s The Thinker explodes onto the front page of the French newspaper, Le Monde¹. The famous sculpture is represented with an IV drip in the arm. Below, a sentence comments: “What if a crisis was the worst time to sacrifice culture?” This is a communication from the E. Leclerc group that implicitly poses as a defender of culture.

This advertisement, published in December 2013, seems very far from the somewhat earlier November 2013 issue of Le Monde, referring to the decision of the Ministers of Economy and Consumer Affairs to take action against the distribution group for “imbalance” in its relationships with its suppliers², a decision followed by the group’s condemnation in January 2014.

After having distinguished itself as an economic player involved in particularly tough negotiations, the E. Leclerc company soon became a brand that defended the common good of culture. The announcement was in line with E. Leclerc’s strategy, an entity concerned with positioning itself on the defense of low prices, ...