Crowing about the Crowbar Awards

I did not feel like going to the Crowbar Awards on Friday night because I was in TGIF mode by the time my work day finished but I am glad I went. It was my first time going and the show was long…really long but a good host, some good speeches and good work made for an interesting and yet un-interesting evening as well.

(L-R: Anthony Kang, president of the 4As presenting the Overall Best of Show Award to a Media Design School, New Zealand team representative)

(Overall Best of Show Award for'McCoys-Never water down a good thing' by Neil Williamson and Rachel Walker)

I was outside the NTUC Auditorium around 6.45pm and had to take the glass lift up to the seventh floor, somehow I was able to stay calm even when I was staring right out the glass, my fear of heights disappeared as the smoky hazed sky totally blocked everything out.

When I reached the auditorium, I ‘checked in’ and got my ticket for the buffet and seating arrangement sorted out, was not hungry so I went to check out the entries on display.
(Best of Category Gold for Film, 'Hollow' by Shi Ming Ming and Yang Lin from Nanyang Academy of Fine Arts)

Once in the display area, I looked around for important marketers to photograph, so I could fill our November issue’s events page spread but at 7pm, there were mostly students just hanging around, showing off their work. I took some pictures of their work and overall I was impressed at the quality.

Now I waited for any ‘adults’ to show up so I could ask them, “Hey you’re not a student right? What are you doing here and where are you from? My name’s Marcus from Marketing magazine…blah blah blah, can I get a picture?”
(Best of Category Gold for Photography, 'SKWIDD' by Cheong Meng Kwong, Ivan)

Hour’s later (ok maybe it was more like hour+++) I had a few good pictures and had continued my slow process of introducing myself to the industry as the new guy on Marketing’s block.

It started getting late so I went to take my seat which was right at the front and next to Carissa or was it Clarissa (didn’t catch her last name) and after chatting with her she told me that she was the host and I should get comfortable because it might be a long show. Oh well, I guess I should have eaten something at the buffet after all, at least the seats were comfortable though.

A couple of good speeches later, namely by Calvin Soh and Farrokh Madon, who are co-chairmen of this year’s Crowbar Awards, the celebration of the work began.

As with the norm of all award shows, there were too many awards but the host kept things lively enough and I can honestly say most of the work was of a high quality so a bronze for this and a bronze for that could be well deserved acknowledgement in retrospect.

Aside from the quality work I was also expecting to see more attitude and character on stage especially after Calvin Soh’s speech about swagger etc, and the fact that these are creative students here tonight. I kept on imagining a guy with a Mohawk running on stage, celebrating his victory with yelling and screaming and punches in the air. That guy never showed up…I guess he failed his copywriting class.