Snowlets
The Snowlets ( Japanese ス ノ ー レ ッ ツ , Sunōrettsu ; Sukki, Nokki, Lekki and Tsukki ) were the official mascots of the 1998 Winter Olympics in Nagano, Japan .
description
Sukki ( ス ッ キ ), Nokki ( ノ ッ キ ), Lekki ( レ ッ キ , Rekki ) and Tsukki ( ツ ッ キ ) are four stylized young owls , each of which has a different plumage color combination. The motif of the owl is supposed to symbolize wisdom on the one hand , and the owl is also supposed to establish a connection to the historical Olympic Games in Greece , where it played a role in mythology. The use of a largely protected bird was intended to underline the closeness of the Winter Games and the organizers to nature. The number of mascots refers to the four-year duration of an Olympiad , i.e. the period between two Olympic Games.
The first letters of the names of the four owls result in the designation Snowlets, whereby Snow ( English snow , snow ' ) stands for winter and lets ( English let's , let (t) us' ) invite the world to the Olympic Games.
The snowlets also symbolize the four basic elements : Sukki stands for fire, Nokki for air, Lekki for earth and Tsukki for water.
Emergence
A weasel with the name Snowple was originally intended to be the mascot of the Winter Games . This idea was rejected by the organizing committee in favor of the four snowlets. The international agency Landor Associates provided the mascot design . Over 47,000 proposals were submitted to the committee to select the names of the mascots, from which the final choice fell on Sukki, Nokki, Lekki and Tsukki.
reception
The design of the four snowlets was sometimes heavily criticized by observers. The Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung ruled that the snowlets would be more reminiscent of “clumsy bags”. The US magazine The Week described Sukki, Nokki, Lekki and Tsukki as "the four owls of the apocalypse", other critics called them the "worst mascots in Olympic history", who would rather fit into a sumo ring than at an event of the Winter Games .
In contrast to the international reception of the appearance of the mascots, most of the merchandising products with the snowlets became popular with the public and some of them were sold out just a few days after the games opened. The official souvenirs with motifs of the four owls included plush toys, textiles and various promotional items .
Others
With Sukki, Nokki, Lekki and Tsukki, four mascots were used simultaneously at a sporting event for the first time. It was not until the five Fuwa , the mascots of the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing, that this number was exceeded.
Landor Associates, the agency that designed the snowlets, also created the torch for the Atlanta 1996 Summer Olympics and was involved in the design of Powder, Copper and Coal , the mascots for the 2002 Salt Lake City Winter Olympics .
Web links
- Nagano 1998 Mascots: Sukki, Nokki, Lekki and Tsukki on the official website of the International Olympic Committee
Individual evidence
- ↑ John Bagratuni: Mascots underline Nagano's wish: Green Games. Rhein-Zeitung, February 4, 1998, accessed on November 29, 2016 .
- ^ A b Olympians to Watch: The Snowlets. The Washington Post, 1998, accessed November 29, 2016 .
- ↑ Ryan Carreon: 45 years of Olympic mascots. Deseret News, April 26, 2012, accessed November 29, 2016 .
- ↑ Olympic mascot: Freak show of mythical creatures. Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, August 5, 2008, accessed on November 29, 2016 .
- ↑ Jon Terbush: Winter Olympic mascots, ranked. The Week, February 7, 2014, accessed November 29, 2016 .
- ↑ Desmond Morris: Owl . Reaction Books, London 2009, ISBN 978-1-86189-710-7 , pp. 75 ( limited preview in Google Book search).
- ↑ a b Olympic accessories. Los Angeles Times, 2016, accessed November 29, 2016 .
- ↑ Queuing for Sukki and Nokki, Lekki and Tsukki. Die Welt, February 21, 1998, accessed November 29, 2016 .
- ↑ Heather Taylor: A Look Back at the Olympic Mascots: 1990s. Advertising Week, July 28, 2016, accessed November 29, 2016 .