Advertising Jury One
ICAD Awards 2020
Des Kavanagh
Jury Chariperson
Des is a writer with BBDO in Dublin. He has been in the industry for over 25 years. His work has been awarded at Cannes, D&AD, Clios, One Show and Epica. He’s also been fortunate enough to pick up ICAD bells of various colours along the way. He has judged before. Indeed, probably, his favourite ICAD memory is when the late, great, Johnny Ferguson asked him to be on a jury in 1997.
Shelley Smoler
International Juror
Shelley has had a very busy couple of years. She’s managed to make plenty of adverts, win a few awards, neglect some office plants, relocate across hemispheres and even get herself banned from an entire African country for a while.
It should be noted that the whole ‘banning from a country’ thing is rare. That was a consequence of helping The Zimbabwean newspaper fight against the oppression of the Mugabe regime by printing messages of protest on actual banknotes. The campaign made history, picking up over 50 awards, including a D&AD Black Pencil, two Grand Clios, the ADC’s first Black Cube and a Cannes Grand Prix. The campaign remains in the British Museum’s permanent collection. A five-year stint at BBH’s London flagship followed, during which Shelley and her creative partner produced work for The Guardian, Audi, Google, Heineken, KFC and Mentos.
In 2017, they were hired as the first creative directors at Droga 5 where 18 months later, they were made the Group Creative Directors. Recently, Shelley has launched campaigns on both sides of the Atlantic for Uniqlo, MINI Electric, Amazon Prime Video and Amazon US.
Bernie Martin
Juror
Bernie is a Writer, Consultant and Free Spirit at her new(ish) venture, The Salty Pen. She grew up in Irish ad agencies, working as a copywriter in Ogilvy, ROTHCO and Irish International (now BBDO Dublin), working her way up to Creative Director level in the latter two. Her clients have included Guinness, Carlsberg, Barry’s Tea, Aer Lingus, Bank of Ireland, Tesco, FoodCloud, Boyne Valley Foods and Cystic Fibrosis Ireland. These days Bernie flies solo, allowing her to make time for voluntary work as a CF Patient Advocate, as well as blogging and working on creative and strategic projects that matter to her. Bernie has been a judge at D&AD and the Emerging Director Awards, and a speaker at The Future conference. She’s passionate about the untapped power of mothers in our industry and is a firm believer in following your own path, not the path expected of you.
Dan Henson
Juror
An International award-winning art director / creative director for experiential, digital, print and film. He brings nearly 20 years of experience from working in telecommunications, charity, retail, FMCG and the automobile industry.
Previously with BBDO Dublin before moving to Boys and Girls as Head of Activation, Dan is now part of The Brill Building Collective where he crafts engaging and award-winning work. He has judged at international level for the European Integrated Marketing Communication Awards between 2017-19 and has served on the boards of IMCC, ICAD and APMC between 2013-20.
Colin Hart
Juror
Colin Hart is an award-winning Creative Director who founded The Public House at the height of the Irish recession. Not many people would set out to start an ad agency in the smouldering rubble of the Celtic Tiger fallout. But after Art Directing his way around the world for powerhouse agencies including DDB Japan, DDB Canada, M&C Saatchi Australia, he returned to Ireland and created an agency that brought his creative philosophy to the fore.
The Public House, so-called because it was founded over a pub and was geared around bringing the conversation of the Irish pub to the advertising industry, was founded with the principle that ‘boring doesn’t sell’ – in other words, the most dangerous thing a brand can do is play it safe. Since he launched the agency he has created a viagra flavoured yoghurt, had his campaigns in the World Science Festival, pissed off a lot of English people, alongside growing an agency with both a national and international reputation.
Prior to The Public House, he was creative lead at DDB Vancouver, Senior Art Director in TBWA Ireland, M&C Saatchi Sydney and DDB Tokyo.
He has won international advertising awards from practically every continent around the world from One Show, Comm Arts, Applied Arts, Bessies, Tokyo Art Directors Awards, ICADS, International Sharks, Australian writers and art directors awards.
