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The Guinness Adverts Project

The Guinness Adverts Project

The Guinness Archive has partnered with the IFI Irish Film Archive to catalogue, digitise and preserve a collection of 16mm and 35mm advertisements made in the 1950s, ’60s, ‘70s, ‘80s and '90s, making it the largest publicly available collection of brand advertising in Ireland and the UK. Inspired by the success of the Irish Adverts Project in 2016, the project is supported by a grant from Coimisiún na Meán’s Archiving Funding Scheme. Created to advertise Guinness to Irish and UK television audiences, the collection of adverts features a wealth of talent both behind and in front of the camera, with directors including Alan Parker, Tony and Ridley Scott; music from artists Elkie Brooks, Clannad and the Chieftains; and a host of well-known faces such as Pete Postlethwaite, Bill Nighy, Robert Lindsay and Jon Pertwee. In addition to their ability to evoke nostalgia, this collection of commercials captures moments in cultural and social history spanning a 50-year period that offers a fascinating insight into changing representations of Irishness both at home and overseas, evolving gender roles and the ever–changing role of the pub in Irish society. Guinness adverts have changed over the years and they are continually evolving to take into account changing society and advertising rules. These adverts may contain historical product claims that are not now endorsed by Diageo. In making these adverts available it is not our intention to promote benefits of drinking but to show historical Guinness advertising in its original context.

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