The Renaissance Powerbranding Peter Arnell takes an almost calculated glee in skewering the advertising business. This serves two functions: It separates Arnell from mere mortals (something he has no trouble doing), and it entertains him. “When I think of Madison Avenue,” the Brooklyn-born adman says to a reporter in Italian, “I think of a dog with his leg up. That's a good image, no?”

It's hardly a typical Arnell image of stark, stylish simplicity, but it expresses his flamboyant disdain for uptown rivals. A large, physically imposing man given to pronouncements like “I would like to run a country,” and “If you look at the Pieta, as an example, my work is a joke.” Arnell saves some of his sharpest comments for advertising. Of his 140 staffers, with offices in New York, San Francisco, and Tokyo, Arnell says, “Call us a creative factory, but do not call us an ad agency.” The point is debatable, given the Arnell Group's impressive roster of clients (Samsung Electronics, Bausch & Lomb, Banana Republic, L'Eggs Hosiery, and others) and storied history of breakthrough work (the DKNY launch, the 30-second Chanel spot featuring a movie-viewer morphing into Marilyn Monroe, the "Simply Samsung" campaign done in compelling black-and-white).

The 37-year-old chairman of the Arnell Group is not the first gifted adman to reject that label. But he does arguably combine the discipline of a designer and architect, with the eye of a fine arts photographer. As a young man, Arnell managed to study with renowned architect Michael Graves, in Princeton and, later, in Rome. There Arnell met Ted Bickford, a fellow student. In the early 1980s, the former study partners returned from Europe and founded Arnell-Bickford, a publishing house specializing in architecture books. Very quickly, however, they branched out, picking up a job for Bergdorf Goodman. When New York Times advertising columnist Philip Dougherty singled out a poster done by the duo (and mistakenly called them an "ad agency") the fortunes and direction of Arnell-Bickford abruptly changed. They helped launch Donna Karan's hosiery line and in the process won the Council of Fashion Designers of America first award for best fashion advertising. Additional work soon followed: Anne Klein, Chanel, Bergdorf Goodman, Christian Lacroix, Allure. In 1993, Ted Bickford left the agency to start a digital sampling company, but the Arnell Group continued to expand and flourish.

Today the sleek and elegant New York offices (designed by Arnell himself) occupy four floors in two adjacent buildings on Prince Street in Soho. At his desk, Arnell directs the agency with the restless energy of someone capable of handling several tasks simultaneously. Between conducting an interview in Italian with a visiting journalist, speaking of Leonardo and Michelangelo and “all those who make our endeavors look puny,” he fields phone calls, passes judgement on work presented to him by colleagues, and decries the state of advertising. “We have no soul,” he says of the business. “The best thing we [advertisers] can do is be witnesses to our culture. We have to register the beat and rhythm of popular culture. And because our work is usually one year ahead, we have to predict the future. We've got to make big predictions about what the style, the taste, is going to be.”

Arnell's work is notable for its stark, seductive images, and often times, it's absence of product. He photographed, for example, the alluring contour of a woman's body to sell Donna Karan hosiery. An Anne Klein II ad simply captured the evocative beauty of a young woman. What she actually wore became largely irrelevant. “I am obsessed with absence.” Arnell says, “What is most important with a picture is what is not there. When an ad is productless, the trick is to make people see what isn't there.”

In its recent Samsung campaign, the Arnell Group did include the products–as well as alluring models. Last year when the campaign premiered. Forbes asked: “Sex and attitude sell clothing, but can it sell home electronics?” The $6 million campaign on behalf of the huge Korean manufacturer, which annually sells about $21 billion worth of electronics worldwide, presented a unique challenge. Many of the company's products are sold by other firms under different names. Samsung, therefore, was not particularly well known in the United States. In terms of image-building, Arnell was given a virtual blank slate.

The result? Billboards, bus posters, magazines, TV commercials, phone booths, featuring tautly-muscled models in stylized poses, clutching microwave ovens and high-resolution TVs. Shot by Arnell himself, the ads utilize minimal body copy, abundant white space, and the tag-line "Simply Samsung." The campaign was created by Arnell; his wife and partner, Sarah; Rie Norregaard; and Dane Solomon. “I think electronics today are more and more like fashion.” Arnell says, adding that the campaign, “evokes a question of what role electronics play in the life of the consumers. I think it's going to give a new slant on consumer electronics as part of our lives, instead of something ancillary.”

For all of their arresting qualities, the ads possess a simplicity that, according to Arnell, is deceptive. The preliminary research took 16 months, a long and meticulous process. Arnell explains: “We did everything–a study of typography, a redesign of the logo, and the packaging. We took the photographs. We did a full study. The work is an editing process. It's about focussing to the point where all is finally crisp and sharp. Then you put it to the consumer. Most companies don't focus, both the camera, as well as conceptually. That's why there's so many unclear images.”

This research process underscores an overall image-building strategy, which Arnell calls "powerbranding." “What we're doing is building environments for these products to live in,” he says, like the student of architecture he once was. According to his theory, everything a consumer sees in relationship to a product is part of its image; the ad campaign constitutes one piece of a much larger picture.

Banana Republic, for example, hired the Arnell Group four years ago to handle its advertising and help redesign the stores. In a perfect world, Arnell would like for his "creative factory" to help develop every facet of a client's image; packaging, store design, advertising, marketing, even product development. Last year the Arnell Group added to its staff a team of industrial designers, working under the name A3D. Arnell gave them directives to "invent" for Samsung the "next new" consumer electronics product.

“Generally speaking, an ad agency creates a piece of communication that represents the company, or the product, or the services. We, in most cases, create the product and the services that are what sells,” he says. “Our work starts at a much earlier stage. We create both a place where product lives, and also a place where the client likes to be. When we do powerbranding, we create a very clear sign that says, 'This is the place,' even if other companies put their signs around it.”

Arnell's work clearly draws upon his architectural background. “Woe know that the roots of modern design originated in the Laurentian Library in Florence,” he says. But he also calls himself a craftsman: “We're technocraftsmen–folks who grab hold of a new technology and bend it to our communication purposes.” Sure, Arnell says he makes use of "cultural history" when he creates advertising, but he's savvy enough to recognize the popular culture it operates in. “Advertising should be entertaining,” Arnell says, “It is not a serious business. It should be an expression of fun. It should be quick, in and out. It should stalk the imagination. And it should not dictate.” Arnell's Criteria–blunt, simple, contradictory, grand, even grandiose. Just like their creator.