Jonathan Horowitz’s “Diet Cola for Men War”

Diet Cola for Men War (306 Cans), 2013, courtesy Galerie Barbara Weiss, Berlin. (Photograph by Jens Ziehe)

For a while I had idly wondered about the difference between Diet Coke and Coke Zero. I was startled to read somewhere that Coke Zero (and Pepsi Max) were “specifically marketed to men, who were shown to associate diet drinks with women.”

As a diabetic consumer of diet beverages, it had never occurred to me that there was anything effeminate about diet cola. (Or else I was just secure enough in my diabetic masculinity not to care.)

Jonathan Horowitz addresses this odd example of masculinity marketing, in his show, “Mrs. Carter and the Diet Cola for Men War” (up right now in Berlin at Galerie Barbara Weiss).

“The cola cans in this work sport the corporations’ latest marketing campaign for their calorie-free soft drinks. In this case, the hyper-masculine look of the products is explicitly geared toward men and is supposed to dispel the femininity commonly associated with dieting.”

Press Release from Galerie Barbara Weiss

Diet Cola for Men War (306 Cans), 2013

Not to suggest that all of Mr. Horowitz’s artworks are about Coke and Pepsi, but as an astute observer of contemporary consumer culture, he serves as one particularly capable war correspondent in today’s cola wars.

“A number of the pieces will be Coke/Pepsi themed, which I see as a broad metaphor for capitalism and personal choice… Coke and Pepsi present an illusion of choice but you’re more or less choosing between the same thing. I have to say though, I prefer Coke to Pepsi—I imagine there actually is a difference, even if I can’t articulate what it is.”

Artforum, June 13, 2013

(Stan Herd, whose “Ottawa Bean Field Cola Wars” we featured in the previous post, had also stipulated to a personal preference for Coke.)

Horowitz’s 2009 “And/Or” (on right) effectively distilled the hollow promise of consumer “freedom” down to a binary choice: a beverage pack of just two cans—one Coke and one Pepsi.

“…on my desk I have a can of Coke and a can of Pepsi that I attached together with a section of plastic six-pack rings. That, I think, I got just right.”

–Jonathan Horowitz,
Interview Magazine, 2009

(More about Horowitz’s “Diet Cola for Men War,” after the fold…)

“The brand rivalry between Pepsi and Coca-Cola — two companies with almost indistinguishable products — has also appeared in earlier works by Horowitz. Since the brand colors of the respective soft drinks match the visual branding for the U.S. Democratic and Republican Parties, this perceived antagonism has tangible political implications. It also becomes a broader metaphor for today’s economic and politic system, one in which “enemies” are in fact best friends who share the market and propel each other forward.”

Press Release from Galerie Barbara Weiss

Some earlier, (non-diet) Coke/Pepsi themed works by Horowitz include the diptych below…

Pepsi/Coke, 2012