Saturday Nov 16, 2024
Saturday Nov 16, 2024
Friday, 20 June 2014 00:00 - - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}
seen quite a few celebrities at our seminars, including Sarah Jessica Parker, Courtney Love and Tor Myhren.
Last night’s award ceremony was particularly interesting. The awards for Cyber, Design, Product Design, Press and the Radio Lions Awards were presented, along with the Young Lions Cyber, Design and Print awards. PR in particular caught our eye. The Chipotle campaign, ‘The Scarecrow’ by Edelman won two Gold Lions and the Grand Prix for PR. This marks the second time that a PR firm has actually won the coveted Grand Prix award.
The campaign launched in September and includes a short animated video and affiliated mobile video game. According to ‘The Scarecrow’ website, the objective of the campaign was to notify “a broader audience” about the details of industrial farming, such as processed food, animal confinement, the use of growth hormones, and toxic pesticides, whilst promoting alternatives.
The campaign was linked to Chipotle’s Food with Integrity initiative, which highlights the Mexican restaurant chain’s commitment to sustainably produced food. It’s clear that PR firms have learned how to play the game, combining visually arresting content along with high substance to deliver top class results.
In the Press Lions we saw a print Christmas campaign created by Adam&EveDDB London as the Press Grand Prix winner. A total of 17 Gold, 27 Silver and 50 Bronze Lions were awarded in the category. The quirky campaign for Harvey Nichols showcased a special Christmas gift collection including gifts such as elastic bands and toothpicks which were presented to loved ones in packaging that stated, ‘Sorry I spent it on myself’.
The Lowe China, Buick campaign for Shanghai General Motors, which won Gold, was declared a close challenger for the Grand Prix. Its executions of “Speed Limit,” “No Left Turn,” “No Trucks,” “No U-Turn,” “Traffic Light Ahead” and “No Entry” each took Gold Lions.
Asia is becoming a strong contender at Cannes. The Design Lions category at Cannes saw a stunning performance with agencies from our region securing 28 of the overall total of 68 Lions awarded. We saw 7 Gold, 8 Silver and 13 Bronze Lions making their way back to Asia. Japan dominated the Asian tally with a total of 17 awards including 5 Gold, 5 Silver and 7 Bronze Lions.
Starting today was tough. We stayed up very late at the award ceremony last night, so I was a little blurry eyed in the morning and I had to run to make the first seminar for the day. We kick started the day with the Saatchi & Saatchi: New Directors Showcase – a legendary showcase which celebrated its 24th birthday at Cannes Lions this year. We got to see = the hottest new directing talent in the industry in a full house session that had everyone excited. . Another great seminar was on ‘The Creative Ingredient’.
Last year, creative work from Brazil contributed to six Grand Prix Awards at Cannes. Four of these ideas involved creative collaborations with countries other than Brazil. Former Cannes Cyber President of the Jury, multiple Grand Prix and Emmy winner P.J. Pereira, a Brazilian living in California and the founder of Pereira & O’Dell engaged us in the seminar. He led a discussion on how to add a touch of Brazilian culture to a global team, as well as how to be the international touch for a Brazilian team.
Following the ‘Art Meets Advertising Remixed’ forums we had a great hour with Microsoft on ‘How Wizards are Changing Culture & Turning Tech into Art’. The session focused on how art and commerce have never been the most romantic or easiest of bedfellows. The session brought this relationship to life without either side losing its relevance.
Microsoft is in a select group which operates as both a global brand seeking cultural resonance and a tech enablement platform furthering what’s possible. At the same time, modern marketing is embracing a new type of artist - a wizard who can transform emerging technology into amazing experiences that create the magic and moments that matter.
We saw how technologists work together with the likes of design pioneers, Wieden+Kennedy, Digital Kitchen, computational photographer James George, data artist Jer Thorpe and creative initiatives like IMSQFT to seize this duality and change how we support and consume creative expressions in the digital age.
Another great workshop was the ‘Build with Lego’ workshop located at the Google Beach. We had the opportunity to unleash our creativity using LEGO’s colourful bricks to help build the most mind-blowing island off Cannes’ shores.
Last year the Cannes Lions team introduced the online viewing of one seminar a day for the public, each seminar was decided on following an online vote and the most popular seminar each day was screened.
Today (Friday 20 June) you can watch ‘The Cannes Debate: Twitter, Viacom, WPP’.
We are all thoroughly enjoying this experience and learning new things every day. Ranil, Matt, Shayani, Marsh and I will be updating you on our last few days at Cannes. Tomorrow there will be more finalists announced along with another great evening of fun and excitement.
