Dubai Lynx Names First 2014 Jury Presidents
The organisers of the Dubai Lynx International Festival of Creativity have announced the first presidents that will step up to lead juries during the region’s most anticipated awards for the creative communications industry.
Graham Fink, Chief Creative Officer of Ogilvy & Mather, will head the Film, Print, Outdoor, Radio and Print Craft jury as well as the Integrated jury. Graham has created some of advertising’s most iconic images and campaigns including the British Airways’ ‘Face’ commercial, Silk Cut/Benson & Hedges, Land Rover, Dixons, Ariston and on and on... His work has won him numerous accolades including Cannes Lions and D&AD Pencils. He has also won four BAFTA’S. Dressing up as an old man to get himself his first job, he went on to work at London’s top agencies before setting up his own production company, thefinktank. Graham is as a strong believer in the nurturing of talent and founded theartschool in 2001 to teach young people coming into the business of creativity, film and design. Now at Ogilvy in China he oversees 17 offices and after just one year in charge picked up Ogilvy Asia’s first ever Cannes Lions Grand Prix in 2012, for Coca-Cola’s ‘#Cokehands’. Commenting on his appointment, Graham says, “It’s a great honour to be chosen as president and I’m looking forward to the challenge. I got a taste of the advertising from the Middle East whilst judging Adfest this year and there was some very good work; which proves that where there’s a lot of sand there is creativity in abundance.”
Philippa Brown, CEO of Omnicom Media Group UK, has been appointed as the Media jury president, about which she says, “I’m delighted to have been selected to chair the Media jury of such prestigious and important awards, and look forward to working with the jury in 2014 to identify the best media work across the region”. Prior to joining OMG UK, Philippa held positions at BBH and DMB&B before joining IPC Media where she held various posts including Managing Director and Group Marketing Director, where she led a team of 90 marketers. She was also a Board Director. Since joining OMG UK in 2007 the company has grown by over 50% in six years, employing 1400 people and has billings of £1.3bn as well as servicing over 275 clients.
Phillippe Meunier, Creative Chief and co-founder at Sid Lee, will lead the Branded Content & Entertainment jury. 20 years ago, Philippe started Sid Lee with the vision of creating a firm that went beyond the traditional and often limiting advertising agency model by developing a multidisciplinary approach they came to define as Commercial Creativity™. The agency has since gone on to be named one of the top three advertising agencies in the world by Advertising Age in 2010. Philippe overseas all the creative output for major international clients including Absolut, adidas, Cirque du Soleil and Red Bull. His diverse role includes recruiting fresh talent from schools around the world which in turn inspired him to set up The Bootcamp, a multidisciplinary, creative experience where recruits spend 10 days immersed in all things creative. About his role as jury president Philippe says, “Brands are leaving our screens to be more imbedded into our entertainment menus. Let’s find some of the best examples to inspire our changing industry.”
The PR jury will be presided over by Gabriela Lungu, Chief Creative Officer UK & EMEA, Weber Shandwick. Gabriela has received over 150 awards and nominations during her career. At Weber Shandwick she is the firm’s first regional Chief Creative Officer, responsible for the creative output for UK and EMEA and an active advocate for building a culture of creativity in PR and award worthy work for clients. Previously she held positions at Ogilvy, where she was Managing Director of Ogilvy Public Relations Romania before founding her own multi-awarded agency The Practice in 2006. Under her creative leadership the agency was ranked number 13 on The Holmes Report’s Creative Index 2012 of the most creative PR firms in the world and won the title of Eastern European Consultancy of the Year in 2013. Gabriela was also responsible for driving the agency to win the first Romanian PR Lion in Cannes. About her upcoming role as jury president Gabriela says, “We all noticed many exciting things from a creative and digital point of view emerging from MENA in the recent years. Lynx is the best way to both capture and stimulate exceptional work, and I’m proud to be a part of it and serve as the jury president for PR. I hope we will have more entries from the PR agencies in the 2014 edition, as there is an amazing potential here; I trust the PR industry in the region is as confident and ambitious as it rightly should be to challenge the other disciplines for the coveted Lynx trophies.”
Commenting on the presidents, Philip Thomas, CEO of Lions Festivals says, “This is a strong start to the line-up of 2014 jury presidents and we’re delighted that Graham, Philippa, Gabriela and Philippe will be joining us to help set the creative benchmark across the region. In recent years we’ve seen an increase in the number of trophies being taken by the region at global awards, proving that creativity in the region is now growing and competing on a worldwide stage. We’re excited to see which entries will shine this time.”
Entries for the awards open on 1 December 2013. Further details of how to enter along with categories and rules can be found online at www.dubailynx.com. The Festival runs from 9-11 March 2014, with the Awards drawing it to a close on 12 March 2014.
