o here I am sitting down after a long day. I’ve been to the Hype Gallery again and actually picked up “Happiness Appears.” It’s amazing in size (A0) which is HUGE and although it’s mainly white I think it was the right thing to do at the time.
—Khaled Abou Alfa, brokenkode.com, February 24, 2004

Meet Khaled Abou Alfa. A building engineer by trade, the 27-year-old’s real passion is art. He posted this entry to his blog in February 2004, after joining 1,200 other burgeoning artists in his first public exhibition — at the Hype Gallery in London.

The Hype Gallery is not your typical art gallery. It has appeared for a month at a time in seven different countries over the course of two years. When the doors open, the walls are bare — no artwork is displayed. Artists bring their work in digital format to the gallery, where it is printed, mounted, and hung. As new artists come in, their art replaces the existing pieces on display, so the gallery changes constantly. And although the art varies in subject and form, from a photograph of a trash can full of fish heads to a charcoal sketch of a dog wearing sunglasses, it all has one thing in common. The titles all include the same two letters: H and P.

The Hewlett-Packard Development Co. (HP) launched this avant-garde event program in 2003 with the help of communications firm Publicis Groupe’s London office. HP’s main objective was to build a community of young and emerging artists that would drive demand for existing and future large-format printers.

Previously, the Palo Alto, CA, technology company used traditional tactics to address this market, including direct mail, workshops, and road shows. But company research showed that these tactics were not getting through to the young artists. HP decided to give these artists what they craved the most — a chance to display their work to the rest of the art community.

“We wanted to create a platform where artists can come together and celebrate their ideas in a special community. These customers usually do not have any chance to bring their artwork to life,” says Guido Hassler, HP’s large format market manager in Germany.

But HP knew it had to be careful how it executed this idea. Alfa and his peers represent a challenging new market for HP — budding international artists who typically scatter when they catch a whiff of corporate marketing.

“We needed a way to create awareness in the graphic market,” Hassler says. “They’re skeptical about the corporate world. Our challenge was how to address them in a way they would feel comfortable.”

The first Hype Gallery opened its doors in London on January 22, 2004, to an entirely empty showroom. It quickly filled to capacity — 380 prints — as artists printed their digital files on HP’s large-format printers.

In addition to printed art, the galleries displayed original films, sculptures, and architectural models. HP’s only requirement for the art was that it incorporate the company’s initials in the artwork, inspiring works such as “Hello Paula,” “Happy Puppet,” “Harmonic Polynomial,” and “Handsome Pierre and the Boy with the Pumpkin Head.”

To keep the galleries as non-corporate as possible, HP resisted the urge to plaster its logo all over the gallery and promotional materials, opting instead for the subtle branding of the event’s name, which also incorporates the letters H and P.

“The word ‘hype’ gave us something very special. I think when you name something you bring it into existence,” says Chris Aldhous, senior copywriter at Publicis Groupe, the Paris-based communications firm that worked with HP to develop the Hype events. “I think if it had been the ‘HP Digital Art Show,’ we probably wouldn’t be talking now. I think ‘Hype’ gave it a focus; it gave it an identity that worked very strongly with the target audience.”

HP’s ultimate goal is not to sell its large format printers, with price tags as high as $30,000, to artists directly, but to show them the technology is available, and to create a demand for the printers at print shops. Because every piece of art displayed at the galleries was printed on an HP printer, HP ensured that each participant had a significant, personal user experience with its product. It also hosted workshops at each of the galleries to teach artists how to format and process their art, and about the available papers for printing.

“By holding these events, we’re making sure we have the possibility to create a large market for the future,” Hassler says. “We’re not establishing business for today, but for tomorrow. Young artists, students, people learning about new technology — this is the most important audience for us.”

hyping it up

The promotional campaign for the Hype events in London started with an oxymoron: clean graffiti. The word Hype began appearing on sidewalks all across the city, created by spray cans filled not with paint but industrial cleaner. Digital photos of the graffiti scattered quickly through cyberspace, posted in blogs and discussion groups and on trendy graphic-design Web sites such as www.surfstation.com and www.artshole.co.uk.

HP also commissioned 13 young film directors to create short films inspired by the letters H and P, with titles such as “Hairdresser’s Praise,” “Hi, Pete,” and “Keep Out: Hysterical Portal.” To reach its target market, HP aired the films on university television stations and at independent cinemas frequented by the art community.

The company also hired artists to create posters with just their art and the word Hype to post across the city. It followed up with a print ad campaign with the same cryptic content and no obvious tie to the company.

Finally, HP sent information packs to art tutors at local universities, with details about how to submit art to the galleries. It also secured editorial coverage about the upcoming event on Web sites and in print publications.

The guerrilla-marketing campaign was designed specifically to appeal to the anti-corporate and creative tendencies of HP’s new audience. “We wanted to find a funny way to access these guys in the market,” says Hassler.

Promotions were customized to each of the seven event locations. In Moscow, for example, HP representatives staged an “Art Revolution,” holding demonstrations and handing out leaflets entitled “Hype Manifesto.”