HUMBLE
Humble, Life Magazine. Issue Title: Ikes Stand on Berlin, Sept 08th 1961.
Image Credit Life Magazine
2023
Humble Ads: A Premonition of the Anthropocene
LIFE Magazine
These advertisements were published by the Humble Oil & Refining Company in Life Magazine throughout the years 1961-62. They present the company as a planetary force, capable of harnessing the power of nature itself. As such, they are a fascinating case study of the power of advertising, and how it shapes our perception of the world around us. Today, these advertisements serve as a potent visual representation of the Anthropocene, a time when human activity is now understood as a geological force capable of altering the stability of the world's climate at unprecedented speed and scale.
Humble Oil & Refining Company is now ExxonMobil - the largest private oil and gas corporation in the world.