Working with my copywriter, Steve Chirhart, we came up with the idea to feature storytellers. We also wanted to extend Dream in Color into a holistic diversity program encompassing Black History Month, Asian Pacific American Heritage Month and Hispanic Heritage Month.
For Black History Month our idea was to showcase slam poets. Then we found we had a connection to Maya Angelou.
Since she's one of the greatest storytellers we jumped on the chance to work with her and tweaked the concept a bit.
The campaign included photography for print and promotions as well as video for broadcast. We also had Dr. Angelou write out a poem that we reprinted as a gift for VIP friends of Target.
The photo shoot was amazing. It took place in her house. Our photographer was Kwaku Alston. His name came to mind because he was a college friend of a friend of mine in Chicago. I always kept his name in mind in case I had a project that was right for him.
The night before the shoot we took a look at location shots of Dr. Angelou's house. One of those shots was of her piano...on that piano was a photo that Kwaku took of Dr. Angelou a few years back for an Oprah Legends photo shoot.
When we arrived at Dr. Angelou's house her niece invited us in. We set up while Dr. Angelou got ready. When she came out I was surprised, she is a tall woman. For some reason I was expecting someone shorter.
In the first 5 minutes of chatting with her I was blown away...everything she says is poetry. During the actual shoot she was a riot...she even told me she like my hair (a guess you'd call it a messy faux-hawk.)
After the shoot we ate with her and got to chat more. She recounted stories of her life. I had read some years ago but I had forgotten. To hear them from her was amazing.
The black and white image above is one of my most cherished photos. To capture her in a great moment being photographed by an amazing photographer was so cool for me.
The printed piece is a spread from a booklet that was in Esquire magazine and in a educational piece mailed to schools. Little & Company helped with the layout for that piece.
my involvement: creative direction, photo direction, art direction and design (at Target)
the team: Agency – Little and Co., Photographer – Kwaku Alston
