In 2011, the Odesa Tourist Association commissioned the famous Russian designer Artemy Lebedev to create a new tourist logo for Odesa. His studio developed a drawing, selected corporate fonts and colours, and also drew up design rules for various useful things: from street signs to souvenirs.
The new logo is the present “anchor-heart”, representing a heart and amphora. It was published on the website of the Design Studio Artemy Lebedev. On one of the images in the brand book, the Odesa logo in red replaces the word “I love” in the phrase “I love Odesa” and symbolizes the heart. This idea refers to the famous New York City logo.
An earlier Odesa logo with a smiling sun was made by the Ukrainian agency Bogush Communications. In 2009, he won a competition to design the city’s symbol, organised by the mayor’s office. But the winning logo was criticized by the Odesans, and it was never given official endorsement.
Odesa Mayor Aleksey Kostusev called the new Odesa logo from Lebedev’s studio “a brilliant find”, according to the “Comments” portal. In 2012, the city even installed a bronze sculpture of the logo in Lanzheron Street, in front of the Opera Theatre square. For the last 10 years, the logo has been used on official documents and promotional materials of the city; and printed on T-shirts, cups and other gadgets. In addition, one anchor-heart sculpture is periodically offered to sister cities by the Odesa mayor for installation in their squares.
War crimes denier
Lebedev is a Russian businessman and supporter of President Vladimir Putin. He is also the son of the writer Tatyana Tolstaya, the great-grandson of the writer Alexey Nikolaevich Tolstoy. He has repeatedly criticized Ukraine or, at least, promoted the thesis that “everything is not so simple.”
More disturbingly, the designer publicly denied Russian war crimes in Bucha and other cities of the Kyiv region, which he called “staging”, supporting the Kremlin’s official version. The designer assured his followers that the civilians who died in the cities were killed by Ukrainian artillery.
On July 12, Lebedev visited the occupied Enerhodar, climbed onto the roof of the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant and took a photo from there for his Instagram account. The Russian designer called this a kind of retaliatory act inflicted on the Ukrainian authorities, who banned him from entering Ukraine in 2017. The state enterprise Enerhoatom, which operates all four nuclear power stations in Ukraine, reported that Lebedev arrived at the Zaporizhzhia site accompanied by Russian soldiers. They plan to film propaganda videos, involving the employees of the plant.
A new logo for Odesa
Petr Obukhov, member of the Odesa City Council and leader of the “European Solidarity” party, called for abandoning the symbol of the city developed by Lebedev.
“It’s time to get rid of the symbol designed by his studio for Odesa. The rights to use this symbol belong to a private person – an Odesa citizen. It’s his business what to do with them. And the official use of the logo is approved by the order of the mayor. And it is the mayor who can cancel this order. I will send a letter with such a proposal.”
Obukhov added:
“Given Lebedev’s love of travel, it would be right to include him on the sanctions lists of the United States, Europe and other democratic countries as a propagandist. By the way, Lebedev owns an apartment in Kyiv. I think that the Ministry of Justice knows what to do with this. We will definitely hold a new competition for the city logo, but after our victory.”
Back in 2011, Lebedev’s studio developed the corporate identity for the Odesa National Academic Opera and Ballet Theatre. Lebedev and his team developed the theatre’s logo, fonts, colour scheme for the presentation, poster, booklets and other advertising and information products, as well as the website.
The development of only one logo in the studio costs about $50,000, according to the website of the Art. Lebedev Studio.
Lebedev repeatedly visited Odesa before he was banned from entering Ukraine.
The views expressed in this article are the author’s and not necessarily those of the Kyiv Post.
