D&AD revealed the Pencil winners for this year’s New Blood Awards, the organisation’s annual awards programme which celebrates emerging creative talent.
The announcement coincided with the New Blood Digital Festival, which took place from 6-10 July 2020 and offered a virtual platform to support and stimulate emerging creatives despite the coronavirus pandemic.
This year, emerging creatives were invited to respond to a series of creative briefs set by a wide range of global brands: Audible, Barclays, BBC, Burger King, Connect4Climate & World Bank Group, Durex, giffgaff, Google and HMCT, HSBC, Intel, Lego, Martini, Nike, Penguin, Rare and Xbox, The Case for Her and Teen Vogue, Twitter, Vbat and Superunion and Yula. Covering wide-ranging disciplines including advertising, branding, typography, experiential and game design, the briefs were designed to provide new talent the experience of working on client briefs that tackled both commercial challenges and social issues. Each brief was supported by learning content designed to help students to transition from education into employment.
213 Pencils were awarded for outstanding work, including 2 Black Pencils, the most prestigious creative accolade. D&AD also awarded 1 White, 39 Yellow, 43 Graphite and 128 Wood Pencils to new creatives this year in recognition of their exceptional creative potential.
Suné Liebenberg, with tutor Pam Lansdell from AAA School of Advertising, won a Wood Pencil for ‘Dis Tjala tyd’ (VBAT Superunion brief). Creative team, Carla Ehlers, Chante Harding and Tulsha Booysen, with tutors Anka Joubert and Mandy Speechly from IIE Vega School (Cape Town), also won a Wood Pencil for Operation-O (The Case For Her and Teen Vogue brief).
Dis Tjala tyd was created to function within Cape Town, which has been rated as South Africa’s most congested city. For this reason, ‘Tjala’ was created with its main aim to alleviate the traffic pressure found within Cape Town. The name came from the Afrikaans saying ‘Dis tjala tyd’ which means it’s the end of the work day and time to go home. The look and feel of the whole scheme was centred around the African culture and liveliness of its people. It aims to create a fun and easy way to travel via a smart e-bike.
The ‘Operation-O’ campaign will seek to normalise conversation on female pleasure because society makes it difficult for women to learn about personal sexual pleasure. The campaign will facilitate self-exploration by creatively using an interactive and entertaining in-browser game, featured on the Teen Vogue website. It will allow young girls to learn useful and interesting facts about sexual pleasure, and consequently put the Power of Pleasure into their hands. The in-browser game will be promoted through an integrated campaign via the relevant Teen Vogue channels.
Since 1980, New Blood has championed and inspired emerging creatives as they prepare to enter the workforce. 2020 marks 40 years since the launch of the programme, and the anniversary comes at a particularly significant moment for the creative sector, as the coronavirus pandemic continues to affect educational institutions and creative businesses. It is now more important than ever to give emerging creatives access to essential learning content and live updates on job opportunities in the ever-changing industry landscape.
For information on all of the Pencil winning entries, please see the D&AD website.
Both a Black and White Pencil were awarded to Inside Stories, an entry in response to the Penguin brief. As books donated to prisons must be brand new, Alex Morris and Jay Parekh from the School of Communication Arts 2.0 conceived the idea to give prisoners the first read of new Penguin books, which ethically conscious readers can purchase afterwards to establish a connection between them and the prisoner. With reading in prison statistically proven to reduce the re-offence rate, giving prisoners access to better quality books is a way to help young offenders find the joy in reading, improve their skills and have a better chance when they reach the outside again.
Her Snkrs also won a Black Pencil, which looks to find equality in the sports community by giving young female athletes the chance to showcase their potential. Clara Laorden, Dani Navajas, Karolina Sosa and Pia Volpino from Miami Ad School Madrid approached the Nike brief by envisioning a new feature in the brand’s app that allows people to sponsor young athletes by buying their Nike merchandise before they get famous, helping to channel young women into becoming professionals in their respective sports field.
Other winning work this year explored the diverse ways that creative thinking can help affect social change, ranging from the power of gamification to leverage important conversations about climate change, to harnessing technology to establish stronger social bonds across communities. Responding to briefs that address topical issues such as inclusive representation, sexual health and body positivity, this year’s Pencil winners exhibit the wide-reaching thinking of the emerging talent pipeline.
