Barking up the Same Tree

In a time when probably no one cared about logo controversies, South Africa’s First National Bank was embroiled in one back in 1986 when it first introduced its acacia tree logo, which has resurfaced with the bank’s most recent logo redesign. Designed by Siegel+Gale, the first controversy was that people saw the shape of Africa in the negative space of the branches and an AK-47 to its left in the positive of the branches; some people also saw a hare and a crocodile. The second controversy was that the drawing of the tree was taken from a botanical book and the artist of the original drawing confronted the bank who proceeded to pay her an undisclosed fee. There were no repercussions towards Siegel+Gale and, reportedly, the client seemed fine with the reference as it showed they