It was in this specific configuration of technological progresses, cultural sensibilities, and theoretical assumptions about the power of persuasion of widely disseminated messages that the phenomenon of ‘aerial advertising’ developed in the first half of the twentieth century. Meanwhile, the general curiosity associated with the sight of aerial technologies from the ground made them peculiar objects of attention. Flying technologies, beginning with the balloon in the eighteenth century, helped to structure the sky as a space through which one could bypass terrestrial transportation routes, but also from which one could see and even speak from above. It was not just a new regime of visual perception that was inaugurated with the colonization of sky, it was also a new, vertical axis of communication. KeywordsĪerial advertising, broadcasting, history of mass media, sky, social meanings of technology Finally, I use the case of aerial advertising to explore some of the negotiations around the various meanings of broadcasting and conclude on the question of the persistence of presence.
Then, turning to the two foundational models of dissemination and dialogue, I address the ambiguous role of pilots as speakers/writers. I explore the specific symbolic and technical configurations of transportation and communication put forth by aerial advertising. This essay sets out to revisit the case of aerial advertising, mobilizing some of the key lessons and themes from Speaking into the Air. Aerial advertising took on various media forms (sonic, visual, textual) and supports (leaflets, light projections, billboard-like print advertising, smoke, audio speakers) and turned to the sky as screen, support, milieu or medium for mass communication. In the interwar period, as commercial aviation was beginning to take shape, a range of technical innovations led to the development of the field of ‘aerial advertising’. Celestial Apparitions : Media-machine, Broadcasting and Aerial Advertising GHISLAIN THIBAULT Université de Montréal, CANADA
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