POLITICAL ADVERTISEMENT is a 40-year-long video project by Antoni Muntadas and Marshall Reese. Every four years, coinciding with the U.S. presidential elections since 1984, Muntadas and Reese compile and update their anthology, tracing the history of political advertising from its origins in 1952 to the present.
The campaign spots are shown without commentary. The latest version debuts one week before election day. In 2020, during the pandemic, the artists streamed their 10th version on the East and West coasts in conversation with curators and political scientists over Zoom.
The phrase “Read My Lips,” the title of this collection, is taken from George H. W. Bush’s acceptance speech at the 1988 Republican Convention, which Bill Clinton’s campaign appropriated in a campaign ad in 1992. Read My Lips is edited from talks with Bill Horrigan, Chief Curator, The Wexner Center, Rick Prelinger, filmmaker and founder of The Prelinger Archives, and Tanya Zimbardo, Assistant Curator of Media Art, SFMOMA.