Welcome to the age of the video game get-out-the-vote rally
Plus: Biden's record ad spending, magazine covers, and why the "Positions" music video is everything
Politicians have now started streaming on Twitch, and the world of political communication may never be the same. Also in this week’s issue:
Joe Biden is now the highest-spending presidential candidate in history
Magazine covers that capture our pre-Election Day political moment
The “Positions” music video is everything
Yours,
Welcome to the age of the video game get-out-the-vote rally
More than 400,000 people tuned in to watch Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-New York) and Ilhan Omar (D-Minnesota) play Among Us, a murder mystery-style game, on the streaming platform Twitch last Tuesday night with streamers including pokimane and Hasan Piker.
The broadcast was promoted as a GOTV-meets-gaming stream, and Ocasio-Cortez encouraged viewers to sign up to vote at the Democratic Party’s voter registration website iwillvote.com. More than 170,000 people were tuned into the stream with AOC before gaming even began, and the number of viewers peaked at more than 430,000, making it among the top-streamed broadcasts ever on Twitch, according to the Verge.
The broadcast felt like a milestone moment in the history of political communications. Ocasio-Cortez and Omar showed how politicians can use gaming and streaming platforms for GOTV efforts, and I think we’ll continue to see politicians increasingly use nontraditional social media strategies to reach voters where they are.
Joe Biden is now the highest-spending presidential candidate in history
Former Vice President Biden broke a record set by former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg for highest-spending presidential campaign last week. Ad Analytics, an ad tracking firm, announced Friday that Biden has now spent $582.7 million on advertising since 2019. In the same time period, President Trump’s campaign spent $342 million.
It’s a reversal for Biden, who one year ago trailed his Democratic primary contenders in fundraising, including his future running mate Sen. Kamala Harris. Last month, however, Biden broke his own record for largest single-month fundraising numbers, bringing in $383 million. Biden said at the final debate that his campaign’s average contribution is $43.
This fundraising advantage is allowing Biden to buy up a lot more ad time than Trump. Biden has $57.5 million reserved in ad time between now and Election Day, while Trump and the RNC have $19.2 million combined.
Magazine covers that capture our pre-Election Day political moment
Credit: Shepard Fairey for Time, Sean McCabe and Ryan Pfluger for Rolling Stone
Magazines are all responding to this historic moment in their own way, with covers that capture the urgency of voting or visualize our current political tensions. These are some of my favorite covers.
For the first time in its 97-year history, Time removed its logo from the cover and changed it to “Vote.” The cover features an illustration of a woman in a “Vote” bandana by Shepard Fairey. It’s Fairey’s third cover for the magazine, following an alternative Hope portrait of Barack Obama used for Time’s Person of the Year issue in 2008, and a portrait of a masked protestor for Person of the Year in 2011.
“In this illustration, the normally clear-cut rebel symbol of a bandana covering a face takes on a different meaning during Covid, becoming an emblem of safety, respect for one's fellow citizens, and a sign that the wearer believes in science,” Fairey said on Instagram.
Rolling Stone put Biden on the cover for its endorsement, with a portrait illustrated by Sean McCabe and based on a photograph by Ryan Pfluger.
Credit: New York
New York magazine teamed up with 48 top artists to design “I Voted” stickers that appear on a series of four covers as well as on peelable sticker sheets included with the issue. Among the featured artists are Amy Sherald, Fairey, KAWS, Barbara Kruger, and Derrick Adams.
The New Republic used a shattered “Vote” illustration by Adam Maida for its cover story about Republican minority rule, and the New Yorker has on its cover American Tumult, an illustration of a twisted flag by artist and musician Richard McGuire.
“I made a few sketches in which I used a twisting flag as a center axis,”McGuire said. “Then I realized everything was right there, in that one symbol.”
Credit: Adam Maida for the New Republic, Richard McGuire for the New Yorker
The Guardian Review used an illustration by artist Edel Rodriguez of an American flag with stripes made from arrows pointing in different directions on its cover. Inside the issue was another illustration by Rodriguez of an upside-down Statue of Liberty set against an arresting red backdrop.
Credit: Edel Rodriguez for the Guardian Review
This Trump painting just sold for $711K
Credit: courtesy Phillips
Trump Descending an Escalator, a 2017 canvas painting of Trump by artist Dana Schutz, sold for £550,000 (or about $711,774) at Phillips’s 20th Century & Contemporary Art sale in London last Tuesday evening.
The painting depicts Trump the day he announced his presidential campaign in Trump Tower in 2015 and it cuts off right above Trump’s eyes. Schutz told the New Yorker in 2017 that she wanted the painting to capture a moment of suspense, “when you know something is going to happen and there’s nothing you can do to stop it.”
“In real life, he looks so dumpy, like a refrigerator,” Schutz said. “I’m happy with how the face turned out, kind of like a mask, with something guarded but threatening about it. He’s coming down, taking us to lower levels of everything.”
The identity of the buyer is not public, per Hyperallergic.
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The “Positions” music video is everything
Ariana Grande released the music video for her new single “Positions” last Thursday after the final presidential debate, and I’m completely obsessed.
The video was directed by Dave Meyers (“God is a Woman”), and in it Grande plays president of the United States. She leads a cabinet meeting, cooks in the White House kitchen, visits Capitol Hill, and watches fireworks from the Oval Office window, all while dressed like Jackie Kennedy from space.
Grande dressed in items including a $2,700 Gucci knit mini dress, an $1,850 Mugler strapless corset top, and a $960 Balmain white and black knit short top.
Credit: @styleforarig/Instagram
The video imagines a presidential administration much more progressive than Trump’s. In one scene, Grande is shown awarding a Postal Service worker with a medal, and her cabinet and staff throughout the video are overwhelmingly female, racially diverse, and queer friendly.
The video appears to have been shot at the Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum in Yorba Linda, California, judging from footage in this behind-the-scenes video.
Kamala Harris got a pair of customized Kamala Harris-inspired Chucks
Democratic vice presidential candidate Kamala Harris appeared on the latest episode of the Complex video series “Sneaker Shopping” Monday. Harris stopped into Social Status, a sneaker store in Charlotte, North Carolina, where she talked shoes and picked up a pair designed in her honor.
“I love my Chucks,” Harris said about her now infamous Converse Chuck Taylors. “I think it’s maybe people don’t expect it but also I think it’s a statement about who we really are. Everybody has their inner kind of Chuck look.”
While in the shop, Harris picked out a pair of Chuck Taylors designed in collaboration between Social Status and artist Nina Chanel. The shoes feature “2020 💙” written on the side plus a collection of pins about topics like voting, Black Lives Matter, and one pin that says “I 💗 Kamala.” Chanel wrote on Instagram that the shoes were inspired by Harris’ interests and the 2020 election.
Social Status said it will donate the rest of its exclusive Nina Chanel collaboration to students in Solefood Digestible Sneaker Culture, a course taught at Johnson C. Smith University in Charlotte, North Carolina.
One more thing…
Cher campaigned for Biden at a socially distanced rally held at Corona Ranch and Rodeo Grounds outside Phoenix on Sunday. The audience was seated in 45 spaced-out chairs and Cher walked out singing “Walking in Memphis.” She spoke about why she’s supporting Biden and asked everyone to go vote and bring someone with them. She closed the set with “Believe.”