OUGD602 - Creative Convos - The Elephant Room

Shannie Mears and Will de Groot came in to talk about their new advertising agency, The Elephant Room. They talked about identity and diversity and how their agency is challenging the advertising industry. They analysed examples of the advertising industry that got things wrong.

Two examples they looked at were the Pepsi advert featuring Kylie Jenner and H&M photographing an item of clothing deemed inappropriate.

The Elephant Room's core value and motivations are to challenge the industry where mistakes are made and to achieve an industry where mistakes like this aren't made. They are pushing for diversity and equality.

These issues are very important, and issues as young creatives, we can challenge and try and solve once we are in the industry. However, I found their talk confusing, I felt they should have been focussing on issues currently in their industry that they can solve directly, such as industry diversity and gender pay gaps.

Their agency is diverse and I thought they should have been pushing this a lot more and promoting it. This is something that I can also address directly if and when I start my own studio or agency. It is an issue that is very current and an issue that can be solved through my work and my approach to the design industry.