MANILA – An inclusive, visual manual on sex education, aptly called ‘Visual AIDS,’ is sending art director, Marielle Nones and copywriter, Leslie Cua to Singapore this September as the Philippine representatives to the Young Spikes competition at the Spikes Asia International Festival of Creativity.
As a response to the brief to “communicate safe sex practices to all Filipinos in order to prevent AIDS/HIV” for the Department of Health, Nones and Cua came up with a manual including illustrations explaining the consequences of engaging in unprotected sex, symptoms of HIV/AIDS, how to use condoms (printed on the condom wrapper itself).
“We came from a background that the Philippines is a country that only recently signed into law an RH bill that mandates sex education (finally). and its still flawed and is only taught in public schools,” explains Nones, a Young Spikes second timer. “Studies show that in developing countries like ours, the most prone to HIV/AIDS are the poor and uneducated. Filipinos who tend to drop out before they reach grade two–so never really even learning how to read/write.”
Thus, the idea to come up with a ‘Visual AIDS’.
“Since the brief was to communicate to all Filipinos, we decided we’d make a message that can talk to everyone. We called it Visual AIDS–a sort of language that translated complicated medical terms/sex education modules into a simple visual format. We put it in touch points that could be reached by everyone, especially the poor. So learning modules were in condoms themselves (reminding you to wear a condom before sex to prevent aids), in sari-sari stores, in textbooks/visual aids classes on ground.”
Nones and Cua competed with 21 other teams from 15 agencies. Team Leo Burnett’s “Safer” was awarded with silver and Team IXM’s “Kantutorials”, bronze.
The Young Spikes jury included PJB’s Alnair Langkay, Leo Burnett’s Kat Limchoc, Lowe’s Abi Aquino, TBWA\SMP’s Joey Tiempo, ASPAC’s Joey Ong, Publicis Manila’s Alvin Tecson and Dentsu Jayme Syfu’s Gogie Sinson.
Spikes Asia is happening on September 21-23 at Suntec City.
