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 The UAE’s advertising photography sector is doing a creditable impression of an end-stage bipolar patient, if a report in Emirates Business 24/7 is to be believed.
On the one hand, Suresh Subramanian of an eponymous photographic agency said: “The professional photography industry in the UAE has been affected as most of the multi-national companies have been affected. Naturally, they cut their budgets on advertising.”
Then on the other, we have Joe Sassine claiming: “The crisis has doubled our work. It didn't affect us at all. There has been an increase in volume and budget of jobs. When there is a recession, people invest more in advertising.”
As Sassine puts it: “What crisis?”
Hey, boys and girls: guess which line the famously upbeat EB 24/7 chose to lead with? We’ll give you a hint – it’s Sassine.
Yes, the headline of the (frankly, illiterate) piece is in fact “Advertising photography in the UAE relatively unharmed by financial crisis”. Which is nice.
However, it does shed some interesting insight into what’s going through the minds of regional photographers at the moment.
The answer seems to be, a lot, and a lot of different thoughts. Sassine thinks everything’s great (good for him, we say), Subramanian has seen a decline, and Ajay Nair of Reflection Photography thinks things are ok, but his clients are bargaining more on prices now.
“The effect [of the crisis] is not that much. It has almost no effect on us, except that before there was not much bargaining, but now we see most of bargaining in our deals. There has been cost cutting in term of fees by about 20-25%,” said Nair, quoted in EB 24/7.
The bolshie, bullish Sassine, on the other hand, is sticking to his prices – unsurprising, if his business really is going up. He also finds time to have a dig at regional creative work as well, describing the ad industry in the Middle East as pretty basic.
“The advertising here is at a primary stage. They are still at the stage of showing the product. They try to put so many messages in a billboard, which is not a brochure, for example. The advertising is too direct, they insist to put so much on the ad they don't need to do this. People are clever enough to understand, they can do more subtle things and this can attract more clients,” suggested Sassine.
Well maybe. Although, given that the most recent attempt to celebrate creativity in the region ended with a bunfight of truly epic proportions, maybe it’s best to keep quiet on that front, just for now.
All in all, though – provided we believe everything these guys say – photography seems to be going through the same uncertainty as the rest of the industry. As it’s mostly composed of smaller players, the sector might be expected to show signs of problems earlier – but judging by these specimens, that does not seem to be the case.
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