Emmét McGonagle, Creativity Reporter at Campaign, chairs a line-up of Robin Fitzgerald, CCO at BBDO Atlanta, Dennis Lueck, CCO at Jung von Matt / Limmat, Shula Sinclair, Global Head of Strategy at Spark Foundry, Andrea Siqueira, Executive Creative Director at BETC São Paulo, and Amy Snow, Creative and Co-founder at Ogilvy Roots and WPP Roots. The panel come together on Zoom to discuss a Pencil-winning piece of work of their choice and debate the future of advertising in the wake of the pandemic.

Fitzgerald chooses the Film4 Idents by Saatchi & Saatchi London for Direct Line, which sees an insurance call centre inundated with plots from films such as Die Hard and Fight Club, in what she sees as a smart buy and strategy. “Creating content specific to each movie and tying it back to the product and these iconic scenes that people connected to was really fresh and I think it sent a bigger message from this brand too,” she says, adding that if they can cover a T-rex taking a bite out of a jeep they can probably cover her Honda.

Lueck chose the hilarious and effective The Punishing Signal by FCB India for the Mumbai Police. Anyone who has visited India will be aware of the horn honking on busy roads and Mumbai FCB India had the ingenious idea of placing a system at junctions in the city which would set the light to red if the honking became too loud. The system has now been rolled out across the city. “They got right into the heart of the problem in a very direct way and it’s such a simple idea, there was no innovation that made it possible it was just creative thinking,” says Sinclair, who also loved the project.

Project Understood, created by FCB Canada together with the Canadian Down Syndrome Society and Google, used AI to collect and analyse the voices of people with Down Syndrome to ensure they could use the Google Assistant. Project Understood was chosen by Siqueira as it was initiated as a solution to a flaw - the assistant should have been programmed to understand this vulnerable section of the community. “It’s not only a creative use of technology, it’s also an important use of technology,” she explains.

Sinclair chose Go Back to Africa Campaign for Black & Abroad by FCB/SIX, which used AI to pull racist insults from the internet, take them out of context and reposition them alongside aspirational images of Black tourists in Africa, turning the offensive material on its head. “What gave it the extra edge was using AI technology to pool Black travellers from across the web and show that this is a reality and it’s not being represented,” she explains.

Snow chose History Blocks by UNESCO and also gave special mention to Christmas ad Silence the Critics by Mother for IKEA for its representation and its clever use of music which plays on the image of grime in the UK. “I absolutely adore this ad,” she says. “This touched on so many amazing cultural insights.” 

Other topics touched on by the panel include the power of humour, brand humility and how not to piggyback on activism.

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