The best European professionals of the advertising and design industries return to the Disseny Hub Barcelona for the 5th ADCE European Creativity Festival: two days — 9th and 10th of November — of inspiring conferences, workshops and networking opportunities.

Headlining the Festival will be the lecture and workshop series titled ‘Rewiring the Creative Machine’, exploring how creativity and technology reconcile through the “design of new workflows and collaborative processes appropriate to the inherent complexity of creativity”, explains Kris Hoet, curator of the Festival and Chief Innovation Officer at Happiness and FCB Global.

Acknowledging the true impact of automation and digitalization on a creative process that is chaotic and unpredictable by nature, is the main topic the keynote speakers will address on Friday, 9th of November:

Workshops and High Potentials

On the morning of Saturday, 10 November, a curated selection of workshops delving into the singularities of the creative process will be available to Full Pass holders. A total of 8, these hands-on workshops aim to inspire and challenge participants abilities at problem-solving, endurance, collaboration, and innovative ways to enhance their inner creativity:

In the afternoon, the Disseny Hub Barcelona auditorium will host the High Potentials session. A challenging and inspiring format designed to help young creatives showcase their skills, make new acquaintances and ultimately, find irresistible jobs. Now in its fourth edition, it brings together emerging new talents with creative directors and HR Managers from highly renowned agencies. During the session, the young participants have the opportunity to present their best work to the public and participate in a ‘speed dating’ with representatives of various agencies to generate new professional relationships.

The overall results of the first edition of the Creative Incubator programme will be presented during the Festival. To respond to some of the core challenges of advertising and design organizations, ADCE has developed this educational initiative in partnership with Pi School. The programme looks at different triggers that could transform business models and organizational design within the creative industries.

What role do virtual reality, augmented reality, artificial intelligence or machine learning play in the agencies? What are the needs that customers will have in the future? These and other questions were explored in the 3 training modules that were offered in Rome, Barcelona and Berlin over the course of this year. While offering room for reflection, the training programme aimed at re-evaluating current business models and the status quo of the creative industry. Jamshid Alamuti, CEO and co-founder of Pi School and Director at Creative Incubator will present the primary conclusions of this work, emphasizing that the programme is “a unique opportunity to solve tomorrow’s problems, uniting technology, creativity and entrepreneurship”.

This year the Festival is hosting the 27th edition of the ADCE Best of European Design and Advertising Awards, the only international competition open only to those works that already won at the most prestigious national competitions of the creative and design industry in Europe. As such, this award is considered to be the “Champions League”.

Under the leadership of ADCE President Ami Hasan, Chairman of hasan & partners, the 2018 Jury Presidents are as follows:

In total, 60 leading creatives and designers have been selected from 19 European countries to judge. The juries will meet in Barcelona on 8 November to debate the best creative work from across Europe, before awarding Gold, Silver and Nomination across each category, as well as the overall Grand Prix. The winners will be announced on Saturday afternoon and a few hours later the Grand Prix 2018 will be revealed at the Festival Closing Party.

2-Day Passes are now available to the general public from €80. A General Pass provides access to Conferences, High Potentials Session, Creative Incubator, networking events and the Festival Closing Party, while Full Passes holders will also be entitled to attend one of the workshops.