June 19, 2017 – Cannes Lions Day 3: #WomenIndustries #TransparentPR

Unlike the film festival, every morning so far has been an early one.  That being said, I also haven’t partied that much at this festival, so it’s kind of an even tradeoff.

To start off our third day, my first talk was at 10:00AM in the Lumiere Theatre.  Titled “Woman and Cinema”, the panel was a repeat from previous years moderated by Claudia Gonzalez Romo, the Special Adviser and Chief of Global Advocacy with UNICEF.  This year, the talk consisted of Chairwoman and Global Chief Creative Officer of Saatchi & Saatchi, Kate Stanners, Australian film director Gillian Armstrong, and CEO of Peral & Dean, Kathryn Jacob, OBE.

The panel was insightful, with key quotes from Mrs. Armstrong.  “There is a feminine perspective, and it’s not just feminine products,” she said, when it came to advertising for women.  The role of women in advertising and creative film in general was emphasized as offering a more accurate perspective as to how women view the world.

That being said, The Beguiled was included on a reel of upcoming films of 2017 to watch.  (It’s ironic because The Beguiled is the least feminist movie of 2017.  Just saying.)

Overall, the talk was amazing, if a little dominated by Mrs. Armstrong compared to the other speakers on the panel, but everything that was said was relevant to the changing industry of Hollywood as it struggles to become more diverse as a business.

Following this, I took a small break to view the work up for awards this evening.  Several pieces stood out to me, including The Unusual Football Field campaign for the AP Thailand Public Company, which focused on innovative urban planning as a force of community building.  I also took a moment to stop by the innovation stage, where several presentations of new technologies and ideas were being showcased at short, ten-minute pitches.

One of these pitches, for Project Bloks, was meant to be a coding training set for children, but which could also be applicable to adults.  The technology itself was fascinating, opening doors for creative thinking with new products and designs.  And what’s even more impressive is that the presentation was finished in less than ten minutes.

Finally, it came time for me to go to the MM&M, Campaign, and Haymarket cabana for a talk on the relevance of PR in the modern age of advertising.  It seems that PR is more important than ever, especially as consumers are starting to demand more and more transparency from large corporations.  

Consumers want to be able to trust the people they buy from, but without good PR relations, it’s much more difficult to build this relationship.

Furthermore, I learned a lot about how the film industry plays a large role in advertising and branding.  Branded films and film festivals are providing more and more opportunities for upcoming filmmakers to break into the industry.  All it takes is a bit more work.

Following this talk, I attended a short session at the Discovery Stage.  Design Forward: Creating for the Future, hosted by Digital McKinley Vice President of Experience Design, Mr. Indy Saha, focused on tips that drive innovation forward in both advertising and technology.  He focused on how startups need to look ahead before the consumer does.  While I agreed with a lot of his main points, some of the details and small biases that he chose to represent made me uncomfortable.  I left the talk but informed, but also wanting to argue with him for a further twenty minutes about the value of consumer privacy and trust.

As I said, PR is more important than ever, and not all entrepreneurs understand that.

Despite the Demi Lovato talk happening, and the New Yorker talk that followed, I decided to go to The Workshop for a new presentation on Social Innovation.  This workshop focused on innovation to inspire social change for issues around the world, and how to start it up yourself.  Consider that I work in Queer activism and health activism at UGA, it felt appropriate for me, especially as our groups attempt to come up with new ideas for fundraising and raising awareness.

In our workshop, my group focused on domestic violence.  A study a few years ago showed that, following sporting events, regardless of the outcome, the quantity of domestic violence reports  increased.  We decided to use this statistic to send a message to the abusers: find healthy, alternative outlets for excess energy.  Our solution was to deliver a physical app that allowed users to utilize augmented reality to play the sports they had just viewed.

The workshop was fairly distracted, considering that the majority of my table had to leave early for other talks, but I was still inspired and impressed by the overall message of the workshop, which emphasized simplicity in innovation.

My last talk of the day was titled Daughters of the Evolution.  Hosted by Goodby Silverstein & Partners, with specific host being author and filmmaker Lauren Greenfield, the daughters of amazing women in the advertising industry came on stage with their mothers to discuss.  Sophie Lefebure, daughter of Pum Lefebure of Design Army, Kia Medlock, daughter of the CCO of Leo Burnett in North America, CEO in Canada Judy John, and Vivian McHugh, daughter Margaret Johnson of Goodby Silverstein, were all present to talk about how their mothers’ work has affected their lives, and how it’s affected their stances in life as young women themselves.

The talk became a discussion on parenthood; how do we have families and also pursue our careers?  Is it worth it?  Despite the doubts that each of the mothers admitted to, the answer was a resounding “yes”.  I found myself more connected with this talk than with any of the others today, because it reminded me of my own mother.  My relationship with her is the strongest one in my life, and even though I’m not a woman, she has inspired me to still be strong for myself and stand for my own identity, both in gender neutrality and in race.

To finish off the night, what better way than with the awards show?  Big winners of course included “Meet Graham” and “Pass the Heinz” campaigns, but there were two other campaigns that I was a little surprised by.  For one, I was surprised that “The Trafficking Exam” had received a bronze lion for outdoor.  For a campaign that is so wrapped in secrecy due to necessity, what kind of outdoor advertising has there been?

Secondly, I wasn’t necessarily surprised, but more resigned to see “Fearless Girl” win the Grand Prix for both outdoor and the Glass Lions.  It’s not that I don’t like the campaign; I love it and I think it’s brilliant.  To be one of only six statues dedicated to women in the entire city of New York is as frustratingly sad as it is remarkable, and the campaign itself has had a global impact.

I just wish that it didn’t erase a message of the immigrant narrative in consequence, especially in this political climate.  Immigration is already under fire.  To make our story (I am a second generation) more invisible in favor of relatively first-world feminism just seems to be a setback.  Not only for the relevance of immigration to America, but also for the world of guerilla art.  To be completely fair, I still believe that Fearless Girl is essential to the message of feminism in America (of which I consider myself to be a part).  However, it’s important to look back and see, in hindsight, the unintentional consequences that marketing can make to campaigns and symbols that are equally as important.

That being said, we don’t want to talk about politics while in France.  So instead, I got a giant steakburger and milkshake from Steak n’ Shake, and we all decided to call it a night.