Title | THE UNFILTERED HISTORY TOUR |
Brand | VICE WORLD NEWS |
Product / Service | VICE WORLD NEWS |
Category | G08. Market Disruption |
Entrant | DENTSU WEBCHUTNEY Bengaluru, INDIA |
Idea Creation | DENTSU WEBCHUTNEY Bengaluru, INDIA |
Idea Creation 2 | DENTSU WEBCHUTNEY Mumbai, INDIA |
Idea Creation 3 | DENTSU WEBCHUTNEY Gurgaon, INDIA |
Media Placement | DENTSU WEBCHUTNEY Mumbai, INDIA |
PR | DENTSU WEBCHUTNEY Mumbai, INDIA |
Production | DENTSU WEBCHUTNEY Mumbai, INDIA |
Production 2 | PIXEL PARTY New Delhi, INDIA |
Production 3 | VICE MEDIA London, UNITED KINGDOM |
Name | Company | Position |
---|---|---|
Gautam Reghunath | Dentsu Creative | Head of Business |
Aditiya P.G. | Dentsu Creative | Head of Creative |
Gurbaksh Singh | Dentsu Creative | Innovation Lead |
Binaifer Dulani | Dentsu Creative | Creative Lead |
Karishma Changroth | Dentsu Creative | Project Lead |
Ashwin Palkar | Dentsu Creative | Creative Head - Art |
Kushal Lalvani | Dentsu Creative | Copy Lead |
Aabhaas Shreshtha | Dentsu Creative | Creative - Art |
Anjali Thomas | Dentsu Creative | Account Manager |
Geetika Sood | Dentsu Creative | Creative Producer |
Niranjan Raghu | Dentsu Creative | Video Lead |
Manish Joseph | Dentsu Creative | Motion Graphics Lead |
Ishtaarth Dalmia | Dentsu Creative | Strategist |
Ananya S Rao | Dentsu Creative | Strategist |
Meghna Yesudas | Dentsu Creative | Social Lead |
Shaleen Wadhwana | Consultant | Research Consultant |
Shreya Vivek Arora | Dentsu Creative | Senior Art Director |
Tanya Paul | Dentsu Creative | Senior Art Director |
Vignesh Praveen | Dentsu Creative | Animation and Video Production |
Manasi Sheth | Dentsu Creative | Art Director |
Rakesh Bairwa | Dentsu Creative | Lead Web Developer |
Rahul Sharma | Dentsu Creative | Web Developer |
Gerson Pearson | Dentsu Creative | Video and Mixed Reality Producer |
Priyanka Borah | Dentsu Creative | Business Lead |
Stuti Sudha | Dentsu Creative | Copywriter |
Amey Chodankar | Dentsu Creative | Creative - Art |
Karthik Nambiar | Dentsu Creative | Creative - Art |
Farishte Irani | Dentsu Creative | Microsite - Copy |
Vaishakh Kolaprath | Dentsu Creative | Art Director |
Ronak Chugh | Rooted Films LLP | Films |
Sameer Rahat | Consultant | Music Composer |
Jeremy Pinto | Vivi5 Studios | Motion Graphics |
Manas Sharma | Vivi5 Studios | Motion Graphics |
Mehul Mahicha | Vivi5 Studios | Motion Graphics |
Ateesh Chattopadhyay | Consultant | . |
Prashant Bhikadia | Consultant | . |
Sachin Ghanekar | Consultant | . |
Emi Eleode | Consultant | . |
Shanel Moraes | Consultant | . |
The Unfiltered History Tour is an AR guerrilla tour of the British Museum’s disputed artefacts.We created Instagram Filters that scan heavily disputed artefacts on display at the Museum. From Egyptologists, to the seventh descendant of the Gweagal Shield - 10 experts and underrepresented colonial voices, for the first time ever, play tour guide in narrating the true histories of artefacts from their homelands. Within its first month, the Tour was championed by Shashi Tharoor and Marc Fennel, covered by VICE competitors like the Guardian, BBC, Hyperallergic, and publications in 10 countries where the artefacts belong to.
The British Museum is the world’s largest receiver of stolen goods with over 8 million objects - that’s a lot of potentially looted artefacts. But for centuries, we’ve only heard the imperialist version of how they got there. An equitable environment can only be created when silenced voices express the intergenerational trauma caused by colonial loot. Brief To place VICE World News at the forefront of conversations around colonialism and challenge dominant cultures by opening up dialogue to countries around the world to create a balance in the way history has been told. Objectives 1. Give a platform to underrepresented minority voices to share their accounts of artefacts that belong to their country. 2. Re-ignite the ongoing conversation on repatriation and postcolonialism with VICE championing marginalised voices. 3. Educate young people about the untold side of history using a tool as accessible as Instagram filters to tell unfiltered stories.
The Unfiltered History Tour is an unauthorised, interactive tour of the British Museum where visitors can scan disputed artefacts and see them being teleported back in time to their home countries. Using Augmented Reality to showcase first-ever visual depictions of scenes of colonial crime, we created Instagram Filters that scan 10 heavily disputed artefacts currently on display at the museum. From the seventh descendant of the Gweagal Shield, to the Governor of Rapa Nui - 10 experts play tour guide in narrating the true histories of artefacts from their homelands. Worldwide, people enjoyed extended podcasts and immersive experiences in the voices of the same experts. Marginalised voices, and their experiences became the narrative of the campaign, overshadowing the Museum’s Imperial narrative. The Tour was developed to reach out to young Britons and ignite conversation on platforms that they know best.
The British Museum’s one-sided, imperialist narrative could only be tackled with authenticity. So, marginalised expert voices from 10 countries were brought on board to tackle this lopsided British narrative - Jamaica, Easter Island, Egypt, Greece, Nigeria, Ghana, Iraq, India, China and Australia. This would enable us to gather traction across a global youth audience, including the 10 home countries these artefacts belonged to. Publications that catered to a wide field - ranging from tech, political history, art history, design and culture were shortlisted to amplify the key message - unfilter a side of history never taught before in textbooks or anywhere else. Each artefact’s true history was further amplified in its home country through Vice’s global distribution network. This approach allowed us to fill the gaps in the British Museum and mainstream narratives with the true stories as told by marginalised, colonised voices from 10 erstwhile British colonies.
The Unfiltered History Tour was developed by a 100-person strong team working remotely for 18 months across 10 timezones. We got expert voices from the countries these artefacts belonged to - Ghana’s Ernest Domfe and Haki Shakur, Nigeria’s Victor Ehikhamenor, Egypt’s Heba Abd el Gawad, Iraq’s Max Joseph, Jamaica’s Sharifa Balfour, Greece’s Petros Apostolakis, Australia’s Claire G Coleman and Rodney Kelly, China’s Fu Yiwen and Rapa Nui’s Tarita Alarcón Rapu and Sergio Rapu. Their accounts of the intergenerational trauma and suffering of their ancestors, along with the looting of their cultural treasures formed the bedrock for the extended 10-part podcast series and Instagram Augmented Reality filters that launched in December, 2021.
In its first month, the campaign has received endorsement from former UN Under-Secretary General Shashi Tharoor, award-winning journalist Marc Fennel and the British Committee, amongst others. Earned media worth $631K 32 million social impressions 40% rise in TikTok followers and 49% increase in total impressions on Instagram 21,583 podcast downloads and 5,200 filter uses (in 30 days) Change in behaviour According to a 2014 survey, 59% of Britons were proud of the British Empire. In a poll conducted weeks after the Tour was launched, 59% of Britons said they believed the Parthenon Marbles (part of the Tour) belonged in Greece. The podcast series let us go a lot deeper with the project and give audiences something heavily educational, not found in British history textbooks. What some users had to say after taking the tour: “Confronts and challenges colonial origins.” “Hearing the past told by multiple perspectives gives depth.”
VICE World News is a newly formed brand, to provide global news reporting for young audiences internationally. In order to grow their cross-platform audience significantly year on year, we needed to cut-through a crowded media environment. The Unfiltered History Tour tackled the marketing challenge of developing awareness and consumption by using a unique format (Augmented Reality backed by journalistic reporting) which captured their audience’s attention. Providing a platform for underrepresented minority voices, allowed VICE World News to travel to Ghana, Nigeria, Egypt, Jamaica, Rapa Nui, Iraq, India and several other countries. They were also able to provide a deeply authentic, international perspective which can often be lost in mainstream news reporting around repatriation of the British Museum’s objects. The podcast series allows users to delve deeper with something heavily educational, moving listeners beyond the habit of simply reacting to news events through headlines and hot takes on social media.