Andy Warhol’s pop art painting of a Coca-Cola bottle is the center of Coke’s newest iteration of its global “Real Magic” campaign.

“Masterpiece” is headed by a video set in a museum where students are sketching, except for one who looks in need of inspiration before the artwork comes to life. The bottle pictured in Warhol’s 1962 piece “Coca Cola (4)” is snatched from the canvas and is subsequently passed between the paintings and sculptures of the gallery, including JMW Turner’s “The Shipwreck,” Munch’s “The Scream,” Van Gogh’s “Bedroom in Arles,” Hiroshige’s “Drum Bridge and Setting Sun,” and finally landing with Vermeer’s “Girl with a Pearl Earring,” who produces a bottle opener and places the drink on the bench next to the struggling student. The student then takes a drink and begins to fill his sketch pad, getting a nod of approval from his teacher as the story ends.

“This is a campaign that only Coke can do,” Pratik Thakar, global head of creative strategy and integrated content for Coca-Cola, said in an interview. “The Andy Warhol art, bringing it to life, you’ll see Coke is not in the story, Coke is the story. It’s the front-and-center aspect.”

The “Masterpiece” film and content were created by Blitzworks and directed by Henry Scholfield of Academy Films with post-production by Electric Theatre Company. The campaign will include digital billboards created by WPP's Open X, the holding company's dedicated Coca-Cola unit. The agency David led this project. The campaign includes digital collectibles created by Tafi and Blitzworks.

“Masterpiece” works on many levels, Thakar said, including “romancing” Coke’s iconic bottle, which conforms to the styles of visual art in the film as it’s passed between pieces. The moving bottle also works as a metaphor for Coke’s distribution system, which was a source of inspiration for the story, he said.

“Basically, an entire universe comes together to uplift this one slumping teenager in a museum. And that’s what happens exactly [in real life],” Thakar said. “It’s where it comes from, and how many people are bringing it to you, whether its transportation, or loading, or a person who serves it to you in a restaurant or a kiosk. So we look at it as that universe comes together whenever you are slumping, or whenever you need that ice-cold refreshment of real magic.”

“Masterpiece” was created primarily to be long-format storytelling on social media, Thakar said. Snippets of the campaign can be cut down for shorter video pieces. The nearly two-minute ad may also run as a commercial in cinemas.

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Interspersed with the widely recognized pieces of art in “Masterpiece” are what Coke called “some of the world’s most exciting emerging creators.” These works include “Divine Idyll” by Aket (Europe); “You Can’t Curse Me,” by Wonder Buhle (Africa); “The Blow Dryer” by Fatima Ramadan (Middle East); “Falling in Library” by Vikram Kushwah (India); and “Natural Encounters” by Stefania Tejada (Latin America). All the artwork in the ad is featured on a website.

Work from the five new artists, along with three pieces from the masters in the ad, will be a part of a digital collectible series Coke will launch in the coming weeks. The out-of-home campaign connected to “Masterpiece” is planned to launch shortly in Latin America, Thakar said. The campaign will come to other markets later this year, including the U.S. 

The “Real Magic” platform, which Coke introduced in 2021 as a means to advertise globally, has been a winner for the brand, Thakar said. It is part of the company's “network model” marketing approach that has led to more global creative briefs that can be used in multiple countries. In the case of "Masterpiece," there is no dialogue, so language differences are not a concern.

“The Real Magic platform works very well across the world. We have seen the success in our business results we have seen success in our consumer engagement,” Thakar said. “And this platform is so versatile. So during Christmas, you see the Real Magic; during the FIFA World Cup, during Ramadan or Chinese New Year, you see the Real Magic. So it works across our initiatives.”

In this case, the brand sought to highlight self-expression and “uplifting refreshment.”

“The refreshment is very real; you can feel it,” Thakar said. “But at the same time, the way it’s delivered, that is very magical.”