MANILA – January 20, 2014 – This year’s adobo Design Awards sees its toughest judging panel yet, composed of artists, designers, and creatives that are themselves award winners.
Heading the jury this year is New York-based graphic designer and educator Lucille Lozada Tenazas. A design luminary, Tenazas has received countless awards for her work, including a National Design Award in Communications Design from the Smithsonian Cooper Hewitt, National Design Museum in 2002, and most recently, the 2013 AIGA Medal–perhaps the most distinguished award in the field of graphic design and communication–awarded by the American Institute of Graphic Arts.
To add to that, Tenazas is also a professor at the prestigious Parsons The New School for Design, and also heads her own communication graphics and design firm, Tenazas Design.
Joining her are some of the creative industry’s most accomplished names: Team Manila designer Jowee Alviar, bag designer and SoFA co-founder Amina Aranaz-Alunan, industrial designer Kenneth Cobonpue, graphic designer AJ Dimarucot, architect Tobias Guggenheimer, TV commercial director Sid Maderazo, Rogue Magazine creative director Miguel Mari, illustrator Dan Matutina, sculptor and artist Leeroy New, animator Armand Serrano, photographer Jay Tablante, shoe designer Brian Tenorio, and design educator Dean Joey Yupangco.
"I’m actually excited. Every year, it’s both exciting and daunting," Matutina told adobo, of being part of the aDA jury for the third time.
He shared that he hopes to see more diverse entries this year, saying "most of the entries come from ad agencies…I’d like to see sana more submissions from the independent design studios, independent designers."
Meanwhile, Guggenheimer told adobo, "I’m looking for things that I recognize and things that are fresh to me, as a person slightly to the left of communication arts…not really fresh ways, but stories and messages told with integrity, that’s the kind of thing I’ll be really looking for."
Ad industry heavyweights will also be part of the jury, including TBWA\SMP associate creative director John Ed de Vera, JWT Manila executive creative director Dave Ferrer, DM9JaymeSyfu chairman and chief creative officer Merlee Jayme, BBDO Guerrero executive creative director Dale Lopez, and MRM Manila deputy executive creative director Budjette Tan.
At the aDA launch last January 14, Jayme gave some tips to those who would like to submit entries in this year’s competition. "Keep it clean, simple, and follow the rules on the size," she said.