The recent "StopEsso" campaign, a high-profile boycott of Esso/Exxon products due to the corporation’s stance on global warming, has been no exception. One of its more provocative billboards featured a strange encounter between George W. Bush and a thrusting gas pump nozzle.

In 1985 the anti-fur campaigners "Lynx" teamed up with Jeremy Pemberton of the Yellowhammer ad agency to produce the landmark "40 Dumb Animals" campaign. Comprised of a ground-breaking cinema and billboard ad with photography by David Bailey, the campaign created a widespread stigma against wearing fur that still causes debate and controversy today.

Catching the rising wave of green consumerism in the 1980s, Anita Roddick’s The Body Shop became the model "green company". It produced naturally-inspired products for skin and hair care, allowed no animal testing, operated strict recycling and refilling practices, ran issue-led campaigns in the UK and community projects all over the world. It also operated a "no advertising" policy, preferring to allow its strong brand identity, products and campaigns to draw customers and loyalty.

Over the past decade, growing resistance to the power that multinational corporations wield over our lives has led to a burgeoning anti-globalisation movement. The McLibel Trial (1994-7) remains one of its biggest statements. Activists David Morris and Helen Steel were taken to court by McDonald’s for distributing "libellous" information in a pamphlet, resulting in the longest running civil libel case in British history. Although Morris and Steel were eventually found guilty of libel on a number of counts, the trial was viewed as a public relations disaster for McDonald’s and a victory for Morris and Steel. The McLibel Support Campaign co-ordinated the substantial publicity, donations and sales of merchandise for trial costs.

Consumers are becoming more aware of the politics of what they buy, what they eat, what they use – and consumer activism has become an additional form of modern-day protest. Meanwhile artists and designers continue to produce a visual evocation of such worries and concerns. From the richly complex graphics of Jonathan Barnbrook to the memorable sight-gags of stencil-artist Banksy – all are intended to stop us in our tracks, interfere with our daily lives, and make us think.

For further information please contact Alison Moloney.