SYDNEY: Despite its ambition to become one of the top pan-Asian
creative award shows, this year's Australasian Writers and Art Directors
Club (AWARD) awards will not have any judges from Asia.
Three Asian judges had been invited, but all failed to take up the
offer, citing work commitments, according to Rowan Dean, chairman of
AWARD.
Dean said AWARD members vote on who will be on the judging panel and the
"jury tends to reflect the membership; where the membership is strongest
is where the jurors are from, which is Australia and New Zealand".
The organisation has 540 members, 30 from Asia, including 22 from
Singapore and four from Hong Kong.
The AWARD show has also experienced a decline in entries from Asia.
Entries from Singapore fell from 560 in 1997 to 160 this year, while
entries from Hong Kong dropped from 85 to 22 over the same period.
This has prompted AWARD to investigate how it can change the selection
process next year to ensure there are more judges from Asia.
"The intention is to have more Asian judges and ideally we want to have
a proper proportional representation," said Dean, who visited Singapore
recently to raise awareness of the organisation and boost
membership.
AWARD is hoping to win over the 63 creatives from Asia who are eligible
to become members because their work reached the finalist stage at
previous AWARD shows.
It also wants Singapore to establish an AWARD School, a training course
for young creatives.
