4th Guanzhong Mangba Art Festival
Pentagram Partner and founder of Do The Green Thing Naresh Ramchandani was D&AD president throughout 2021/22. Here, he recalls navigating his position through a year of change and challenge for the creative industry and beyond.
For most of us, 2021 was an exceptionally challenging year.
We had misogynistic narcissists heading up nations on either side of the Atlantic and distorting the democratic process. We had savage weather disasters and a toothless COP. We had an international migration crisis. The fight to make Black Lives Matter. The appalling spectacle of Weinstein trying to defend his sexual abuses. The gap between rich and poor becoming an irreparable gulf.
And then we had Covid, with its wholesale disruption of our lives, its assault on physically vulnerable and economically disadvantaged people, its horrible load on the mental health of young people, the economic demands that came with it and the economic slump that followed in its wake.
And then we had our day jobs – essentially, making money by showing up and helping to sell any product or service that comes our way. For me, the dissonance between the way of the world and the nature of our work had never been clearer, and the questions back to our industry never more fundamental.
This was the context in which I was handed the Presidency of D&AD: I tried to address it as best as I could.
“For me, the dissonance between the way of the world and the nature of our work had never been clearer, and the questions back to our industry never more fundamental.”
Firstly, in the thought pieces I wrote, interviews I gave and talks I delivered, I tried to argue that the creative industry has a responsibility toward social justice and climate action. Creative people, we’re furious optimists, and every time we do a piece of creative work we take the world apart and reassemble it in a better way. But if we’re putting it back together, that’s better for some but considerably worse for other communities, cultures and generations – that’s no grounds for optimism. When we choose the right clients, briefs and creative approaches, we can make it better for all.
Secondly, I tried to argue that work that advances the greater good is what creative excellence is right now – which of course is D&AD’s reason for being. We’re living in a time of purpose, and when it's delivered insincerely, it’s a bad trend and a terrible cliche. But when it’s done well, good intentions plus excellent execution equals brilliance and makes work that simply sells stuff pale by comparison.
That’s why I gave Kim Gehrig the President’s Award – because one of her many gifts is her ability to make societal change dazzlingly attractive and something we all want to be part of. And that’s why I was so thrilled and inspired by the year’s six Black Pencils across the Professional and New Blood awards. Chosen by the world’s most eminent judges, Black Pencils are the highest accolades from the world’s premier awards show and in this particular year, they all went to work looking to advance the greater good. With work as strong as FCB Chicago’s Boards of Change – spectacular polling booths made from graffitied plywood boards that had barricaded storefronts during the BLM protests – this was the industry sending us the clearest possible signal.
“Creative people, we’re furious optimists, and every time we do a piece of creative work we take the world apart and reassemble it in a better way.”
Thirdly, I tried to focus on the next generation of creatives as much as possible. D&AD is an educational charity, and its work with next generation creatives had never been needed more. With the pandemic limiting student experiences and grad job prospects, and with a generation of creatives inheriting a world rife with social and climate injustice, 2021 was a hard year to be young and hopeful.
So I spoke at colleges as much as possible, supported New Blood and Shift wherever I could, helped to reinstate New Blood trustees going forward and revived the President’s Lectures as a series of online “Dinners With”, with wonderful creative luminaries whose work and perspectives would enrich the next creative generation.
What did all of that accomplish? It’s hard to say for sure. A year is ridiculously short. 12 months on Zoom has many limitations, and I imagine that there’s an in-built confirmation bias – many of the people I met and talked to most likely shared my views.
That said, I found many people in the industry alive to the need for change. Whether for ethical, commercial or creative reasons or all of them – it doesn’t matter. I found designers and ad folk waking up to the idea of being more selective with their clients, and more diverse with their talent – and that’s good news.
This is even better news when you look to the future. If social and environmental responsibility is a learned position for a certain generation of creatives, I found that for a new generation, it’s absolutely innate. For the next generation of creatives, every brief is a brief for the world, every piece of work is a chance to improve it. This new blood is exactly what the industry needs.