SWEDISH FURNITURE COMPANY JOTEX JOINS THE DEBATE ON AI WITH A 7-MINUTES SHORT FILM AND A PHOTO EDITORIAL

Will the rise of AI bring dystopia? Jotex explores the question in a 7-minute short film and photo editorial entitled “Living With Humans”. The film stars Dutch dancer and choreographer Marie-Louise Hertog and a lot of furniture.

“Like most people we are extremely fascinated by the rapid development of AI that comes with seemingly endless possibilities. But the excitement also comes with a great deal of uncertainty.” says Peter Keerberg, Jotex CEO. “I think we all have a sense that AI will have an unprecedented impact, we just have no idea how. That was the starting point for our approach to the campaign narrative – we aim to raise questions rather than give answers” Nikolaj Fremming, Interim Creative Director at Jotex. “It’s easy to assume the worst and historically that is how humans have reacted to major scientific breakthroughs. So we’ve been very conscious about striking a balance that leaves a lot of room for interpretation.” adds Markus Danielsson, Jotex CMO. “But just like in every good story, the main character has to go through a lot and learn something on her journey.” teases Nikolaj Fremming.

To express the state of mind of the main character, an AI-being, the campaign cleverly integrates the furniture with the choreography. “Creating widely different moods with furniture-combinations from the eclectic range of Jotex, is a very visual way of expressing
both the darkness and the hope in the story.”

The campaign consists of a 07:15 minutes short film and a photo editorial launching on Instagram and Jotex’ websites across the eight countries where Jotex is currently available. The creative team behind it is a mix of Swedes, Danes, Brits and the German-based Dutch dancer who boasts a 120K following on Instagram.

For more information contact Nikolaj Fremming [email protected]

FROM THE CREATIVE PROCESS

Why a 7-minute film?

We see this campaign as an opportunity to express both our fascination and concern with AI and share it with the world. We wanted to tell a story of a possible outcome of the incredible impact that we see on our lives already. The intention was to have a complete story arch, so we knew that would take at least 2-3 minutes. That is already a lot to ask for the in the age of social media. But during the recording and we when saw the material, it seemed more and more that the story needed at least double as much time to be told in the right way and to convey all the emotions that we hope for it to do. And seeing the amazing performance of Marie-Louise Hertog, we are not afraid to go for the longer format. There is something mesmerizing about her – she becomes the character in such a strong way. Perhaps that’s what made some people cry during the recording, she simply moved people. It was very special to witness.

The visual world of the film

When you think of the concept dystopia it’s tempting to go all dark and messy, but our ambition was to create an aesthetic that was dystopian yet with a clearly defined architecture as a dynamic backdrop to the products. In our exploration phase we came across the work of Japanese architect Tadao Ando who is both a master of cool and of light. His work with concrete materials has served as important inspiration. And when you’re combining dystopian vibes with AI we had to also look at the first Bladerunner film, which treated the topic in such an interesting way already back in 1982. If you look closely, you will find many references in Living With Humans to that.

Achieving the look

We started out by testing different 3D visualizations of the set to get the dimensions to work in our favor. We don’t have unlimited space in the Jotex studio so we tried to optimize the set design to create the sensation of a really big industrial space. The set was then built in the Jotex studio according to the exact specifications.

The costume

For the costume we reached out to Danish designer Julie Svensson who has worked on many Danish productions and specializes in the grungy dystopian genre. We went for a upcycled look that hints at a future where resources are scarce.

Choreography & camera work

To get the choreography and camera movements just right we teamed up with Danish dancer and choreographer, Frederikke Lønberg, in a huge yoga studio in Copenhagen, Denmark ahead of the actual shoot days in Borås, Sweden. We went through all the scenes with the rehearsal dancer while experimenting with different ways to tell the story from a photographic perspective. This informed many of the decisions that went into the final film.

The director

This campaign is almost entirely created by in-house resources at Jotex. Nikolaj Fremming (DK) who serves as interim Creative Director at Jotex, has written and directed the film. Having just completed his degree in Screen writing from a Danish university he was keen to put his new skills to the test. Nikolaj has previously directed a number of short films, commercials and mini-documentaries.

The team

The core creative team and the producer are all Jotex employees and external talents such as the dancer, the director of photography, the still photographer, the set stylist, costume designer, make-up & hair and the composer were hand-picked from Sweden Denmark, The Netherlands and the UK.