On My Radar: Joachim Back

What’s the best ad campaign you’ve seen recently?

There are three. Miles Jay’s film starring John Malkovitch for Squarespace, James Rouse’s Designated Driver for the AA and Seb Edwards’ Timeless for Lacoste, which is a little older, but so good I had to include it. They’re all multi award-winners, of course, but I’ve chosen these because they all have good, simple ideas at their heart. It’s important to shoot things that connect with people and challenge their intellect, but that doesn’t mean an ad has to be big to be good. It can be small, but if it is big, it does need a clever idea behind it.

What website(s) do you use most regularly and why?

I prefer to be in the real world, which means I’m not online a lot. I’m a bit old fashioned when it comes to the web; it’s strictly used for emails and checking in.

What’s the most recent piece of tech that you’ve bought and why?

I love taking photos; so I recently bought a Leica M7 film camera. My great pleasure is to walk out alone into the world and take small journeys. Forms speak to me. It could be human, nature, man-made, architecture, the sea, the sky, the ground I walk on. Something will catch my eye and in that moment, I love to be able to properly focus on it, see it and capture it.

Facebook, Instagram or Twitter?

I like human contact. Human beings are nice! I find it strange to know everything about everyone; people are not one dimensional, they have multiple personas and are a different person to the many different people in their lives. Social media takes that away; it takes away your complexities and depths, making you flat. People believe what you present to them, they think they know everything about you through your social media, which means when you meet them you have nothing to say. Face to face, all of your senses are working. You see people for who they really are, not through their manufactured image. You get a better understanding of whom you’re talking to. That’s important to me - to be real and in the moment.

What’s your favourite app on your phone and why?

I’m not a big fan of technology, but I do appreciate Whatsapp, especially when working on a shoot, it’s useful and means I can stay in touch with my team and with my friends and family whilst I’m away. I also rely on the iPhone weather app! I travel a lot. Light is important for my work and as it lets me check many different locations, I’m able to keep an eye on the rainfall in Denmark; that way I know how my rhododendrons are.

What’s your favourite TV show and why?

Going on Netflix or Amazon is a bit like walking into a shopping mall: it’s predictable. There’s so much choice, but everything looks the same. I do like True Detective, though. It was really well done, with some very nice storytelling, but to be honest, I’d rather watch a film.

What film do you think everyone should have seen?

David Lean’s Oliver Twist from 1948 starring Alec Guinness as Fagin. Lean had originally made his directorial reputation with interpretations of Noel Coward, but in 1946 he branched out and shot Great Expectations, winning a couple of Oscars. Following that success, he returned to Dickens and chose Oliver Twist, attracted by the larger than life characters and the original Cruikshank illustrations – these were used as a starting point for the whole look and feel of the film, including Fagin’s make up, which was so powerful that the film’s US release was held up by three years – Lean hadn’t anticipated that the world was still reeling from the Holocaust and that this caricature could cause mass outrage.

It’s a bleak film, but with stunning imagery. The chiaroscuro draws a deep connection between contemporary film noir and primitive English crime fiction. It’s an incredible piece of storytelling. You must see it!

Where were you when inspiration last struck?

I love tending to my flowers in my garden. You’re immersed in creating something physical, building something lasting. It takes time. With your hands, you work with the ground and the plants and you initiate change, but unlike most things in this world today, which are so immediate and easy, you have to wait for the results. Then in the spring, it comes. It’s in these quiet, absorbed moments of creation that great ideas come to me.

What’s the most significant change you’ve witnessed in the industry since you started working in it?

Fear. Recession makes people so afraid. This caution has a negative impact on creativity. But it’s cyclical, it’s happened before and it will happen again. Creativity is such a force; it always bounces back. It’s on its way back now, actually. For a long time we’ve all been avoiding risk, but it’s on the up again.

If there was one thing you could change about the advertising industry, what would it be?

I’d go back to film. It has more sensitivity and more feeling because it’s chemical and fluid. Digital can be so cold.

What or who has most influenced your career and why?

The Italian film director, Federico Fellini. I love everything he’s done. It’s magical and fun. I highly recommend starting with I Viteloni; the score by Nino Rota is mind-blowing, hauntingly beautiful. La Dolce Vita [pictured below] is a must, as is Juliet of the Spirits, his first colour movie and then his 1983 film, And the Ships Sail On – he had Dante Ferretti recreate the exterior and the interior of a pre-WW1 cruise ship; one of his most moving films, it’s incredible, and heart-warming.

Tell us one thing about yourself that most people won’t know….

I can ride a unicycle and I’m really good at wheelies. I grew up next door to a school for disabled children and would spend a lot of time over there. We used to play on their wheelchairs and I got really good at riding around on two wheels. Getting to one wheel was a simple progression.