Presentations by world class international professionals fill out the Festival’s first day
Machines that learn by themselves, sustainable fashion, freelance warriors and creativity with a capital “C” were the stars the first day of Sitges Next, the Festival of innovation in communication that’s in its third year and being held today and tomorrow. Famous creatives from both national and international spheres came together at the Retiro Theater in Sitges to offer the audience a wide variety of proposals with innovation as the common denominator.
Under the slogan We are all explorers of the future, Sitges Next 2017 kicked off this morning with the workshop Medieval Mercenary Warriors, at the Stämpfli Foundation. Freelance creative director Emma Pueyo made her experience available to participants, attempting to reveal some of the secrets of the trade.
The presentations were opened by the Mayor of Sitges, Miquel Forns, who pointed out that “a town that has a great film festival also has to have an advertising festival, like other cities around the world”. The Festival Director, Xavier Duran, and its curator, Helena Marzo, also welcomed everyone, highlighting the innovative spirit of the event.
Afterwards, Stephane Scheyven of Contagious Communications broke the ice with the presentation Machine Learning: arguably the most important macro trend. Scheyven explained that “machine learning tries to teach computers to learn on their own”. It is a macro trend that, in the next decade, will have an essential importance in all kinds of businesses, including advertising.
The co-President and chief creative officer of the Alma DDB agency, Àlvar Suñol, contributed his unorthodox creative culture to the Festival with the presentation Llámame romántico si quieres (Call me romantic if you want). “There is nothing more innovative than a good idea that’s well executed”, he remarked. Suñol explained the success story Spanish Lessons, created by Alma DDB for the Netflix series Narcos.
“Where some see trash, we see beauty”. This is the philosophy of Ecoalf, a sustainable fashion company that que creates its collections using waste materials, like plastic bottles. Their marketing director, Pedro Martínez, added the ecologist note to Sitges Next with his presentation In trash we trust: sostenibilidad como diferencial (sustainability as a differential).
In the afternoon, Sitges Next was submerged into the universe of startups with Mark Brooks, brand director at Behance and creative director at 99U. In his presentation, Navegando el horizonte creativo en el mundo emergente de las startups (Navigating the creative horizon in the emerging world of startups), Brooks pointed out the necessity of adapting to a new panorama, seeing that “in 2016, more than ten million startups were created between the UK and the US”, he pointed out.
Sitges Next is being held on May 5th and 6th, is organized by the Sitges Town Council, and is sponsored by the Xarxa de Comunicació Local with collaboration from the Consejo Regulador de la DO Ribera del Duero and Estrella Damm. The communication campaign was created by the &Rosàs agency. The Festival has an Advisory Board made up of the Catalonian Generalitat, the Col·legi de Publicitaris i Relacions Públiques, Mobile World Capital, the Blanquerna Faculty at Ramon Llull University and the Catalan Audiovisual Cluster.