
Agency	GREAT Advertising Group
Creative head	Dmitriy Makarov
Author of idea	Dmitriy Makarov
Product	anti-racism in the stadium
Description	The history and fame of St. Petersburg are inextricably intertwined with Pushkin. Squares, streets and buildings bear the poet’s name, and the rhythms of his immortal verse form the very heartbeat of the city. And when a supporter of the city’s football team, Zenit St. Petersburg, threw a banana at famous Brazilian star Roberto Carlos, an international scandal erupted, and the football community called on Zenit to be brought to account. Who, the football world wanted to know, would tackle the problem of racism at Zenit’s stadium? Pushkin? The club responded thus: Of course, Pushkin! Because Pushkin is in all of us. Even the most hardcore skinhead has fond childhood memories of Pushkin’s tales. And, of course, because ‘the father of Russian poetry’ was himself dark-skinned. Thus the idea for a project entitled ‘The Sun of Russian Poetry at Zenit’ was born. The well-known artist Nikolai Kopeikin and the country’s most famous rapper Noize MC were asked to take part in the project. As a result, an animated version of Pushkin was transformed into a Zenit fan, and appeared in a cartoon singing ‘The Pushkin Rap’. The animation went viral on the Internet in Russia, and the song, which became a regular part of Noize MC’s repertoire at live gigs, quickly found its way onto the playlists of various radio stations. As anticipated, the project attracted a lot of media interest, and was the cause of heated discussions on the Internet. Consequently, a lot of public figures decided to lend their support to the project, and referenced the Zenit scheme in discussions on social networks about Russian culture and social tolerance. Throughout the project, Zenit maintained an ongoing dialogue with its fans, prompting them to reflect on the fact that the literary heritage of the Russian language, of which the country is so proud, was created by a man whose roots lie in Ethiopia, namely Alexander Pushkin!
Team members	Art director Kirill Rojkov, Yuriy Vorobiev Copiwriter Ksenia Buksha, Andrey Danskov

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