Len Sirowitz, an award-winning promoting art director whose work within the Sixties included memorable print ads for the Volkswagen Beetle – akin to the declaration: “Ugly is only skin deep” – and a campaign for Mobil that dropped off a automotive in 10-story constructing to attract attention to the risks of speeding, he died on March 4 at his home in Manhattan. He was 91 years old.
His death was announced by his daughter, Laura Sirowitz.
Mr. Sirowitz joined the influential promoting agency Doyle Dane Bernbach, often known as DDB, in 1959 at the age of 27 and spent the subsequent 11 years with the corporate, with wit and passion developing promoting looks for varied accounts.
“Quite early in my career, I started to realize that my message not only had to be bold and bold, but it had to come from the truth… and touch human emotions,” he told Dave Dye, who runs an promoting blog. From the Loftin 2015.
Volkswagen was probably Mr. Sirowitz’s most significant account, and the homely Beetle, nicknamed “The Bug”, was his and copywriter Robert Levenson’s automotive muse. Their collaborations with the German carmaker included the ad “Will We Ever Kill the Bug?” by which they placed the Beetle, fallen on its roof, like a dead worm. The answer to the query: “Never.” (Although after a couple of shots the automotive’s roof collapsed.)
The pair also got here up with an ad featuring a colourful Beetle fabricated from green and beige fenders, a blue hood and turquoise doors, all of which were stitched together from 1958–1964 models. The ad emphasized the convenience with which owners could find parts.
For Sara Lee, Mr. Sirowitz and Mr. Levenson created a television business by which people handled hassles akin to haircuts and traffic, then consoled themselves with a slice of the corporate’s cake, introducing a melody that might soon be ongoing: “Everyone doesn’t like something/But Nobody likes Sarah Lee.”
In public newspaper and Mobil television advertisements about road safety, Mr. Sirowitz illustrated how a 60-mph crash would have the same impact as throwing a car 10 stories. “And he will take you to the exact same place – the mortuary,” the narrator said.
Another Mobil television ad showed a pair sitting in a automotive while the person drove into the blinding headlights of oncoming traffic, which ultimately led to an accident. The narrator says: “At Mobil we sell gasoline and oil. We are supporters of driving and love, but not at the same time.
And for the Better Vision Institute, an association of lens and frame manufacturers, Mr. Sirowitz prepared dozens of promotions that appeared in Life magazine, encouraging people to have their eyes checked more often. One particularly dramatic ad was all black, with text by Leon Meadows that read: “This is what many Americans think yellow daisies in green pastures against a blue sky look like.”
Bob Isherwood, Saatchi & Saatchi’s former global creative director, called Mr. Sirowitz a “hero art director” for his flow of fresh ideas and different approach.
“It was just an idea he put on the website,” he said in a telephone interview. “When you see ads like that, you think that, ‘Oh God, I wish I had done that.'”
Leonard Sirowitz was born on June 25, 1932 in Brooklyn. His father, Abraham Sirowitz, emigrated from Ukraine in 1905 and worked in various positions, including: as a taxi driver and jewelry polisher. His mother, Sadie (Schoenwetter) Sirowitz, took care of the home.
Mr. Sirowitz’s passion for drawing led to his studies at the Art Students League of New York in Manhattan at the age of 12, and two years later, acceptance into the High School of Music and Art (now Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Music & Art and Performing Arts) . There he met his future wife Myrna Florman, a music student known as Mickey, when he was 17 and she was 14.
Mr. Sirowitz graduated from Pratt Institute in 1953 with a bachelor’s degree in advertising. He spent the next two years in the Army, mostly at Fort Dix, New Jersey, and during his service in January 1955 he married Miss Florman. She survives him along with her daughter; son Michael; and one grandson.
After his discharge from the military, Mr. Sirowitz worked at the pharmaceutical advertising agency LW Frohlich, as well as at Gray Advertising, CBS and Channel 13, a public television station in New York.
In addition to working for DDB’s commercial clients such as Sony, where Mr. Sirowitz created a quirky campaign based on the portability of his four-inch TV, he also volunteered on political issues.
A full-page newspaper ad from 1965 for the National Committee for a Sound Nuclear Policy featured a cockroach on a white background with the headline: “Victor of World War III.”
Another 1968 ad for the Coalition for a Democratic Alternative featured the all-caps headline “What for?” Below is a text by copywriter Dave Reider describing the hopelessness of the war in Vietnam, demanding the resignation of President Lyndon B. Johnson, and supporting the Democratic presidential candidacy of Senator Eugene McCarthy of Minnesota.
Mr. Sirowitz was senior vice president and deputy creative director of DDB when he left in 1970 to found his own agency, Harper Rosenfeld Sirowitz, as co-president and co-creative director. (The name has been changed many times over the years.) By then, he had been voted art director of the year in 1968 and 1970 in national polls conducted by Ad Weekly. He was introduced to 1985 Art Directors Club Hall of Fame.
His agency’s clients included Swissair, McDonald’s, Smith Corona and Royal Caribbean Cruises. Nevertheless, in 1995 the company closed after losing several clients, and Mr. Sirowitz joined the Ryan Drossman & Partners agency as vice president.
He soon retired and returned to the Art Student League, where he drew large-scale nude charcoal portraits four days a week until the pandemic broke out.
“I strive for bold, dramatic interpretations of the model’s pose, drawn with spontaneous, sweeping lines, and most significantly, it needs to be a part of a powerful, well-designed composition,” he told the institution’s magazine, Lines from the Leaguewithin the 2012–2013 issue.
His compositional style was prominent in advertising campaigns, including a 1991 campaign for America West Airlines in which he cast improvisational comedian Jonathan Winters – tough-guy looking and dressed in camouflage – in a parody of Gen. H. Norman Schwarzkopf, who he recently commanded American troops during the Persian Gulf War.
The announcement read “Declaring Air Superiority for Civilians” and offered discounts on plane tickets of up to 40 percent.
However, the campaign was rebuked by the Veterans of Foreign Wars for being in poor taste, and America West filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection shortly thereafter.
“In my opinion, a great ad should make your palms sweat,” Sirowitz told The Associated Press. “America West is the smallest of the major airlines. We wanted to create the type of advertising that would put them on the map in one fell swoop.”
