Cannes report back: Collaboration key to creativity. A guest post by Anton Crone, Executive Creative Director, Saatchi & Saatchi Cape Town

Cannes. La Croisette. Locked onto the scent of red carpet we are heading for La Palais du Festival; the Med to our left, the Majestic hotel to our right and leashed chihuahua’s everywhere in between. Like a snail underfoot, except crunchy on the inside, you have to keep your eyes peeled for these guide dogs of the gliteratti, but if they are not trotting along the pavement with their madame in tow, they are taking a well deserved Louise Vuitton bag break, nesting among mascara sticks and bejeweled cell phones.

But no sun for us; no comparing mast sizes in the yacht parking lot. It’s the colour of your cat that matters here; it’s the darkness of the Palais and the more enlightening windows onto the world of advertising for us.

There’s the old A2 window onto the world, Press and Outdoor, the bread and butter of award shows. This translates into a standard of ideas that can often be described as average. But even if it’s a fresh coat of gloss to the familiar, it is the craft that is astounding. It leaves you gazing at the window in wonder, and that’s a marvelous feeling, a reminder that we are artists and that we have to apply a high level of craft to every aspect of our work for it to truly stand out.

But where Press and Outdoor is the path to metal for many, it’s the big picture that impresses most. Here, the really mind blowing work is to be found in PR, Direct, Promo and Activation. The effective work involves the participants to an incredibly high level. It stimulates the consumer at a level advertising has never done before.

These are the categories that are growing, not because they are easy, but because they are hard and that’s a healthy sign for this industry. It is a sign that advertising is a profession full of clever people who love a challenge. It’s evolving dramatically. What we were trained for yesterday we have to rethink tomorrow – and that’s exciting. We have to collaborate more within the agency across our different disciplines, get more people with their diverse range of talents to participate in the process. Like the consumer, for us participation is just as vital.

When we leave the Palais, the sun is still high and we’re locked onto the scent of Leffe beer. We dodge a few guide dogs and settle down at a café to compare notes. A few years ago we would have talked about an idea that lives on a sheet of paper or on a TV screen. Today we talk about a big idea that lives in the world, an idea that surrounds us – that we can participate with. It’s not the beer that’s making me feel giddy, it’s the possibilities and the challenges ahead that are exciting. Art evolves to a great degree as it keeps up with the times, and often, leads it. It’s wonderful to be in a profession that can do the same.