Leo Burnett scores a bronze for Dinodia Photo Library at the Andy Awards

Leo Burnett, Mumbai, has bagged a bronze at the US based Andy Awards for its press entry for the Dinodia Photo Library, titled ‘Bhopal Gas’, in the Newspaper: Industrial/Building Products and Services category. The ad had earlier fetched the agency a bronze at the recent AAAI Goafest.

The press ad, created by KV Sridhar, Santosh Padhi, Russell Barrett and Mona Mehra, shows a stark photograph of a Bhopal Gas tragedy victim (a small child) on the left hand side. The abbreviation ‘vs’, denoting versus, is scrawled in the middle and a 1,000 word long copy on the right hand side describes the entire experience of the Bhopal gas tragedy.

This war of copy and visual gets summed up thus: ‘Dinodia Photo Library. Every picture is worth a thousand words’.

Santosh Padhi, executive creative director and national head, art, Leo Burnett, talks about the communication task before the agency. “Dinodia Photo Library has one of the largest collections of images, particularly images that are essentially Indian in nature. So, we adopted the route that no amount of words can match up to the impact of a single picture.”

So, ‘A picture is worth a thousand words’ seemed to be the perfect platform to say it. Only, ‘A’ was replaced with ‘Every’ to denote that every picture in the library evokes powerful emotions. In addition, the copy comprised exactly 1,000 words.

‘Bhopal Gas’ was only one in a campaign of three. While the second ad showed an ecstatic Kapil Dev holding up the 1983 Cricket World Cup Trophy, the third one had Mahatma Gandhi picking up salt from the ground during his well-known Dandi March.

Leo Burnett’s entry was the only one from India to make it to the Andy Awards this year. Piyush Pandey, executive chairman and national creative director, O&M India, was the only Indian name to feature on the jury panel this year.

For the record, the International Andy Awards were established in 1964 by the Advertising Club of New York. The goal of the Awards is to honour creativity in advertising throughout the world, recognise the contributions of individuals and companies who create the work, and encourage raising the standards of craftsmanship in the industry. Judged by a jury comprising internationally renowned creative directors, awards are given to both single and campaign executions, distinguished by product, service or technique category.

The Andys began as a New York print-only show, but it has now evolved into an international show covering print, radio, television, out-of-home, direct mail, video/cinema, interactive and other media. Winners also compete for the Andy Awards’ highest honour, the Grandy.

© 2006 agencyfaqs!