We learned a lot about water, things like how school attendance in girls goes up when a tap is installed in a house. A number of facts like this opened our eyes to real story of water. We started to describe it as a ripple effect and wanted to find a way of bringing the the acceleration to prosperity that water provides. We needed to do this simply yet quickly and evocatively whilst bringing Stella Artois’s water credibility to the story. We decided to build a contemporary art installation, a 600 glass chalice zoetrope, 4 meter high, and weighing 750kg. Building this animation for real would help give a sense of scale to the situation we were drawing attention to. Each chalice contains a single frame of illustration, that rotated at speed creates a stop frame animation that details how life changes with water.

The final film was launched by Matt Damon at this year’s sundance festival, and was written about in international publications soon after. The zoetrope was broadcast on TV in North America and Europe as well as longer versions broadcast and shared online. Each version ends on this year’s limited edition chalices, directing viewers to our Buy A Lady A Drink website. Here they were able to purchase a limited edition chalice and have an impact on a life without access to clean water. The campaign is still running at the time of writing, but has already brought in more donations than the previous year.

The long term outcome is the one featured in the zoetrope itself. It’s a university education for someone’s child, time to start a business, it’s experiences made together as a family that don’t involve walking to water. For the brand, it has helped Stella Artois develop its relationship with Water.org but more importantly has galvanised the business itself to dedicate even more resource to changing lives around the world with water.