The Brief
Midas was hired by Gianfranco Meggiato to implement a PR Campaign for “Quantum Man: There Is No Future Without Memory” at the Valley of Temples in Sicily, Italy. As part of the publicity campaign, Midas pitched for widespread news coverage as well as photo stories and interview opportunities with Gianfranco Meggiato across national and international news, arts, history, literary, culture and lifestyle, travel and broadcast media. In addition to generating media coverage, a key objective for the PR campaign included shining a light on Gianfranco’s profile as a leading international artist within the UK press.
The Work
Midas created a three-month PR Campaign to run from mid-September – late November to cover the majority of the exhibition run and prepare all press materials including a press release and a press pack containing press images.
Throughout the campaign we approached visual arts media, national news publications, history, travel and culture writers, to secure a range of coverage in the UK press media and beyond. We focused on a variety of angles including celebrating the 100th Anniversary of the Valley of the Temple’s excavation, environmental and scientific angles relating to the Quantum physics which inspires many of Gianfranco’s works. However, the angle that held most interest in the UK press was the story of Alexander Hardcastle, specifically many journalists were keen to understand why this archaeologist was wiped from the history books.
This angle resulted in national coverage in the Observer, The Guardian, Daily Mirror and Daily Star, in addition to within history publications like The Past and Archaeology World.
We are still awaiting the publication of a story looking at Gianfranco’s exhibition in relation to Hardcastle’s story from the Daily Express, in addition to print coverage of Gianfranco’s artist profile with Reader’s Digest, which is due out in January 2022.
The Results
Midas secured 28 total pieces of coverage with a combined readership of 239 million (238,785,559).
Media highlights included: 19 pieces international news coverage including The Observer (141,000), The Sunday Mirror (442,000), I newspaper (215,640) the Herald (22,901), The Times (304,000), The Guardian (15,200,000) amongst others. Newspaper and international news was a key target for this campaign, meaning our efforts were focused on broadsheet and online news publications.
Within this, we also achieve coverage in MSN UK (47,800,000), News Break (807,000), Yahoo Singapore (66,900,000) and Yahoo Canada (1,200,000) amongst others.
8 pieces of quality magazine coverage were also achieved including Reader’s Digest (19,700), Conde Nast Traveller (81,078) Wanderlust (40,240), The Past (50,000) and Current Archaeology UK (25,000) amongst others, this included print and online coverage.
What the Press Said
The Times:
“Gianfranco Meggiato’s quantum theory-inspired contemporary sculptures are juxtaposed with the ancient architecture in the Valley of the Temples Archaeological Park in Sicily…”
Reader’s Digest:
“This exhibition merges contemporary sculpture with ancient architecture through forms that seem to defy gravity, creating a dialogue that goes beyond space and time, generating new connections between mythology, art, and science…”
The Daily Mirror:
“As part of the 100-year anniversary celebrations, UNESCO have organised an exhibition by leading sculptor Gianfranco Meggiato which includes 13 monumental sculptures placed around The Valley of the Temples…”
The Daily Star:
“Quantum Man: There Is No Future Without Memory …juxtaposes stunningly preserved Ancient Greek architecture with quantum theory inspired contemporary art…”
Arts and Collections:
“All thirteen works have been carefully situated within the Valley of the Temples to prompt a dialogue with the rich cultural and mythological contexts of each of the temples, their gods and legends…”
