
The Story Behind the IKEA Photo of Amsterdam - danso
https://petapixel.com/2018/11/20/the-story-behind-that-ikea-photo-of-amsterdam/
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schoen
Please watch the video rather than just reading the article (there's _much_
more material in the documentary).

Actually, the video made me cry a little bit.

After watching the video, I found [https://www.deepakg.com/the-canal-in-ikeas-
amsterdam-photo](https://www.deepakg.com/the-canal-in-ikeas-amsterdam-photo)
which gives the location and the name of the houseboat. (If you want to see it
in Google Street View, a better search is probably Brouwersgracht 56.)

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benj111
I tried watching the video, my Dutch is a bit rusty. As a warning to others,
there is a nsfw bit.

~~~
mcv
I'm always a bit surprised by this. Is watching videos otherwise fine at work?

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lordnacho
Where I grew up almost every pizza shop would have two specific photos
hanging.

\- "American Girl in Italy" which appeared to be a lady being leered at by a
whole load of guys. [https://edition.cnn.com/2017/03/30/europe/tbt-ruth-orkin-
ame...](https://edition.cnn.com/2017/03/30/europe/tbt-ruth-orkin-american-
girl-in-italy/index.html)

\- "Lunch Atop a Skyscraper" which is a bunch of guys sitting suspended in the
air.
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7QCYDzsQ_yM](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7QCYDzsQ_yM)

Not sure why those particular two, but I'm almost surprised if I don't see one
of them in one of those types of shops.

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choot
>American Girl in Italy" which appeared to be a lady being leered at by a
whole load of guys.

When you are not good looking, leering behaviour is called harassment. So,
this painting promotes harassment it seems.

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specialist
Sorry you're being downvoted. I just spent 30m poking around. Their story is
terrific and remains relevant today.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruth_Orkin](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruth_Orkin)

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ninalee_Craig](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ninalee_Craig)

~~~
tonyedgecombe
Craig said in 2014 "At no time was I unhappy or harassed in Europe" and that
the photograph is not a symbol of harassment. It's a symbol of a woman having
an absolutely wonderful time!" and "Italian men are very appreciative, and
it's nice to be appreciated. I wasn't the least bit offended."

~~~
choot
That photo happened long ago. That's a key point here. Today things have
changed.

Sure, even some slaves weren't offended at the time when slavery was
acceptable. Today, this behaviour is considered harrasment.

Feel free to try it on the street and put a video for us.

~~~
prepend
I don’t think this is a reasonable assumption. If the participants explicitly
stated that the photo isn’t harassment, then it’s unjust for us to assume
things about the situation unless we have some information that supports the
assumption.

~~~
kaybe
Still, as a woman myself, I feel vividly uncomfortable looking at the image.
Her expression does not help, and even if she was smiling or looking happy -
this is what you'd do to protect yourself. (A smile under pressure means
nothing. You'd even say it was fine during situation itself for the same
reason.)

I'm glad she says it was fine, and I notice my perception is coloured by my
own experiences. Still, for me, it's a powerful image, and one I wouldn't put
up for background decoration.

~~~
prepend
I’m sorry you feel uncomfortable looking at it. As an agoraphobe, as am I.

Hopefully, with a strong support system, we can both overcome our irrational
discomfort from pictures of things that truly present no harm.

Restaurants are really incapable of trying to accommodate all the edge cases
for discomfort. Interestingly, I bet seeing these in some way helps.

~~~
kaybe
The thing is, from my experience, this is _not_ always a harmless situation.
Seeing this reminds me of those times and makes me think of mitigation
strategies to make sure I'm safe. (See that look on her face? My first read of
that is 'Don't make eye contact, don't acknowledge them or they'll follow you
around the block and into any smaller streets and if you're unlucky back to
your house.')

The fact that there's so many groups of seemingly unrelated guys in the
picture is good though, they will keep each other in check and if there's
trouble some of them will step up to help. If you can be sure there won't be a
small subset of them following you one minute later, it could be worse. They
seem to be on some sort of break, so you're probably safe from that. The guy
with the scooter looks the most problematic, so keep an eye on that one
without looking at him.

This is a normal though process for many women. In almost all cases it's
perfectly safe, but you _need_ to catch the one where it isn't. Are you
telling me this is irrational?

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techstrategist
There's something about this that resonates with me, in the stark reality of
the intersection / tension between art and commerce:

“Finally, I got in touch with the lead designer at IKEA who had picked the
photo more than 10 years ago. I ask him why he picked the photo, and he told
me that the first thing they design at IKEA is the price.

This photo was just very, very cheap, and that’s why they picked it.”

We {makers | artists | artisans} want to create something that's great, or
beautiful, or complete. But commercially, what's viable is the (forgive the
cliche) Pareto solution. This photo is 80% of a great photo, at 20% of the
price. I tend to forget that the 80% solution is an option to consider when
I'm working on a project.

I coincidentally live in Amsterdam and also have been learning photography,
not because of any intrinsic interest but because my wife said "buy an SLR
because we'll be having kids in a few years, and I want to have nice photos of
them." We now have a baby (and many wonderful photos), but I find myself
really frustrated that I've put significant effort into learning the technical
part of the skillset and she has not. But when I really consider the
imbalance, it's true that she can get the 80% result with point and shoot auto
or my presets, and there's no reason for me to get judgmental that she doesn't
make more of an effort.

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matchagaucho
Reminds of the saying _" You can own 100% of nothing or 10% of something
big."_

When partnering with a distributor like IKEA, and considering they've sold
~500K of these prints, a "cheap" royalty can be very lucrative.

~~~
techstrategist
So true. One of my dreams is to sell Ikea on an affordable, extensible set of
construction toys hearkening back to the great industrial sets rather that the
branded plastic collectible stuff that’s popular now. One day...

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tivert
> Finally, I got in touch with the lead designer at IKEA who had picked the
> photo more than 10 years ago. I ask him why he picked the photo, and he told
> me that the first thing they design at IKEA is the price.

> This photo was just very, very cheap, and that’s why they picked it.

It makes total sense, but seeing it stated directly like that reduces my
desire for their art and decor. Not knowing how they do things lets you fool
yourself into thinking there's something more there than the cheapest
acceptable photo from an archive.

Edit: decor -> art and decor

~~~
avar
Were you under the impression that IKEA's flimsy materials and construction
were some quaint design choices unrelated to cost?

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the_mitsuhiko
> Were you under the impression that IKEA's flimsy materials and construction
> were some quaint design choices unrelated to cost?

The interesting thing about IKEA is that while the materials are cheap, they
are also build to last. You can disassemble IKEA stuff and reassemble it
without breaking it too much and they know that because their customer support
is amazing. I carried boatloads of things back and replaced them because they
were no fit.

If IKEA would build just flimsy thing they could not afford that level of
customer support because everybody would just replace the broken parts. They
don't break nearly as often as you would believe.

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crtasm
There's a fairly regular stream of the really budget stuff chucked out on the
streets around where I live; drawers, wardrobes, shelving units etc. Some of
it has probably lasted a fair while but I wish the better made models were
more even more affordable somehow.

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pouetpouet
It's nice to hear from the designer himself not to overinterpret the choices.
It could have been any other photo, any other colour for the bike.

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tobyhinloopen
Yeah I loved his reply

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holografix
Really enjoyed this!

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salmonz
I find it funny that 400K people have put up a photo with an overflowing trash
bin in their living room. We noticed this after we bought and couldn’t stop
laughing. We literally hung up a picture of garbage.

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ekianjo
> This photo was just very, very cheap, and that’s why they picked it.

Sounds like a poor justification. There are tons of pictures in the public
domain so it's not like there is no abundance of choice there.

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dr_hooo
It was from a famous photographer and it was cheap. Sounds like a good deal to
me.

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martokus
En example of why I love the HN community - there's something special in this
story that is hard to explain and not everyone will understand. But people
here seem to!

