Sunday, December 01, 2013

When Did Parade Balloons Stop Being Creepy? (And How Do We Get the Strangeness Back?)

click images for larger view
Our traditional holiday piece, The Short Brutal Life of A Parade Balloon, focuses on their more mortal aspects   . . .
The Atlantic's Phillip Bump has stumbled across the not unsurprising fact that The Macy's Thanksgiving Parade Balloons Used to Be Extremely Creepy, with everything from flying pigs . . .
image: New York Public Library
. . . to alligators, grumpy Captain Nemo's, and floating disembodied heads . . . 
image: Associated Press
I don't have any balloon images from old Chicago parades, but this photo of a glammed-up Humpty Dumpty on State Street may gave an idea of the idiom of the day . .  .
image courtesy The Chuckman Collection
Today, even in Chicago, balloons tend to veer towards a Disneyfied blandness . . .
.  . . and the most readily recognized brands . . .  
Is it too late to get a little strangeness back into the parade balloon design equation?  I'm cheered by this Instagram image from Bjarke Ingels from this year's Macy's parade . . . 






No comments: