Call for Entries: Cause/Affect

The San Francisco AIGA is once again asking for your best socially conscious design work for their cause/affect competition...

Design Competition Seeks "Do-Gooders"

cause/affect is a biennial graphic design competition which celebrates the work of designers and organizations who set out to positively impact our society. Produced by AIGA San Francisco, this is a competition for do-gooders who do good work. Send in your entries before June 19, 2009.

The details of the competition are simple: all work entered must promote or support social good. All we ask is that it doesn't contribute directly to the profit of a commercial organization. And to qualify, work must have been produced between November 1, 2007 and June 19, 2009.

Winning work will be showcased at the cause/affect awards ceremony in July and displayed at the AIGA SF gallery through the summer. Winning entrants will also be featured on the cause/affect site and a portion of any proceeds from the competition will be donated to a local non-profit organization. For entry forms, and more information, please visit: http://causeaffect.aigasf.org/

The competition generated a tremendous amount of interest during its inaugural year in 2007, and this time out the organizers expect to receive a similarly enthusiastic response. "We were staggered by the global interest the competition stimulated" said Brian Singer, AIGA SF President, "...we received entries from as far afield as Norway, the Netherlands and Singapore. And this year, with excitement about the competition mounting, and the blogosphere clicking into high gear, we're expecting to see do-gooders flooding our offices with another batch of awe-inspiring work."

More Good (50x70)

The Good 50x70 folks have created a new Amsterdam specific version of their social design poster contest, that's still open to the general international public...

For the first time we're combining all Good 50x70's activities into one project - working with local charities, designers, schools to produce posters that will be displayed around Amsterdam and collected in a book that will published globally. As an extra incentive to enter, the creators of the 'winning' posters will work with a member of our jury of leading Dutch designers (including creatives from KesselsKramer, Only, Gorilla and ...,staat) to produce the final poster.

The Amsterdam contest is open to everyone, irrespective of location, and entries are welcomes until Midnight on Monday the 13th of April. The briefs are available, in Dutch and English, to download at http://good50x70.org/local/amsterdam/2009/

Also FYI they've extended the deadline for the international Good 50x70 to midnight on the 10th of April.

Vote for the One Flag

Adbusters recently had a call for designs for a flag to represent the entire world. They've narrowed the 1,000+ submissions down to 32 and now they're asking the public to vote for the best one. The winner will actually be put into production and distributed by Adbusters. You have until March 14th to cast your vote and I would be remiss if I didn't say that my friend Bizhan from T.O.W.A.R. designed the "All For One" flag (above) and would very much appreciate your vote. Choose your flag HERE.

Language Matters

DESIGN 21 just announced the winners of their Languages Matter! poster competition:

As the world continues to metaphorically shrink, so too does the global language pool. It is estimated that in a few generations, more than half of the nearly 7,000 known languages spoken around the world will disappear--taking along with it an unwritten account of a history, tradition and culture. In an effort to safeguard native languages and promote linguistic diversity, DESIGN 21: Social Design Network--an online platform founded by Felissimo and UNESCO to promote better design for the greater good--is proud to announce the winners of its latest competition. Developed by DESIGN 21 to help UNESCO raise awareness among designers about the importance of multilingualism, Languages Matter! is a contest that called on its international base of 18,000 members to design the official poster for International Mother Language Day on February 21st, 2009.

Overall winner: Anna Notara Koutroumpaki "Mother Language Must Live" Greece
























D21 JUDGE'S PICK (Jacques Lange): Jonathan Schute "50% Matters!" United States

























D21 JUDGE'S PICK (Omar Vulpinari): Vito Bica "Mother and Tongues" Germany
























See more entries and learn more about the competition HERE.

Green Earth

One year after the 2007 "Love Your Earth" competition, Designboom.com along with TOBU department store and the Design Associaton Japan (DA) launched a new competition last summer : "Green Earth". This is an international design competition open to everyone created to raise awareness of the environmental issues affecting the planet.

There are two categories, the first one being "Green" and the second one being "Earth".
Green: Create a graphic artwork that illustrates the environmental protection and how human beings and nature could coexist in a greener world.
Earth: Give the gift of a greener world at Christmas. Create a graphic artwork that will make this festive time of the year a moment to consider what we can do to help our planet’Äôs survival.

The designers of the 5 winning entries were granted with cash prize awards

Also, TOBU department store printed a selection of the shortlisted entries on their "eco-bags" and other promotional material, which have been shown during the Tokyo Designer’Äôs Week 2008 (30 October - 03 November, 2008).

3966 designers from 91 different countries participated and the winners are :

1st Prize : "greening" design by : ji yoon yang from korea.

2nd Prize : "recycle at xmas" design by : benjamyn cox + lloyd moffat from uk.























3rd Prize : "plain cloud" design by : glen baghurst + matthew cullin from australia























santa's readjustment ' design by : camila gimeno from chile

See the results.

source.

ReThinking The Environment In The Carolinas

The Raleigh AIGA recently asked me to be one of the judges for a poster competition promoting environmentalism in North and South Carolina called: re|THINK. The 20 winning posters, selected by myself and 2 other judges, will be on display (and for sale) at the Designbox gallery in Raleigh, NC for the month of April, with an opening reception on April 4th. Even if you're not in the area you can preview all of the winning designs online now HERE.

Call for Entries: Socially Conscious Design Competition

The San Francisco AIGA's socially conscious design competition Cause/Affect is accepting submissions now through November 9th. From their site:

cause/affect is a biennial graphic design competition which celebrates the work of designers and organizations who set out to positively impact our society and communities.

All work entered in the competition must promote or support social good and actively engage in enriching our lives. It can raise awareness about a cause or condition. It can celebrate an arts institution or event. All we ask is that it doesn’Äôt contribute directly to the profit of a commercial organization.

This is a competition for do-gooders, who do good work. And it is open to all.

More details and entry forms can be found here.

Thanks Brad!

Carbon Conscious Consumer

New American Dream wants you to become a Carbon Conscious Consumer. Their site posts monthly challenges (last month's was to eat one pound a week of local food) and lists the carbon emissions saved by the folks who pledge to participate. They're even offering eco-friendly prizes to folks who get the most people involved in the campaign. Find out more here.

Lewis Black on Gun Violence

Comedian Lewis Black has made this short video for the Brady Center which is hosting an anti-gun violence video contest (warning this site has audio when you first open it). Current submissions to the campaign can be seen here.

Index Awards for Design To Improve Life

The non-profit Copenhagen based Index promotes "Design To Improve Life" via networking and annual international industrial design competitions. This year's Index: Awards nominees are available for review online. Under the categories Body, Home, Work, Play, and Community the entries range from easier to use tourniquets to eco-friendly knives to alternative school furniture. Learn more here.

Media That Matters 7

The winners of the seventh annual Media That Matters Film Festival are now online. The sixteen featured documentaries are 8 minutes or shroter and range in subject matter from garbage recyclers in Egypt to 5th graders in the Bronx who try veganism. Watch them all here.

Good Posters

While you've missed your chance to participate in the Good 50x70 poster design competition, which encouraged students and professionals to create posters on five pressing social justice issues, you can see the co-winners and shortlisted finalists, juried by a group of well-respected folks, for each category here:

• AIDS
• Environmental Damage
• Human Rights
• Undersdevelopment
• War

Profits from sales of catalogs of the posters will go to the charities that supported the competition.

Thanks Marc!