Design students submit entries for UAE awards

Targeting design talent at local universities, the awards have generated a lot of interest and entries are expected from 7 colleges, all to be judged under the careful scrutiny of Professor Maureen Wayman, Pro Vice Chancellor, Dean of Faculty of Art and Design, Manchester Metropolitan University.

Professor Wayman will chair the judging committee supported by representatives from the key sponsors and associates, including Mr Mohammed Binghalib, Project Director of Dubai's International Media Production Zone.

With more than 30 years experience, Professor Wayman is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts, an adviser to several universities and an experienced external examiner. She is currently a member of the Higher Education Academy's Research and Development project team concerned with enhancing support for external examiners.

An exhibition of the entries and the awards ceremony itself will be presented at the Gulf Pack and Gulf Print event being held at Dubai's Airport Expo between 19 - 22 September. Judging of all submitted entries will take place at Dubai Media City on 5th July.

According to Dominic McGill, Fairs & Exhibitions Project Manager for Gulf Print, 'The awards have set out to support tertiary education facilities in the UAE, to encourage their students and bring them together with industry. A number of the event's sponsors have even included work placement opportunities as prizes.'

Sponsors have played an important role in making the awards possible. So far, in addition to the IMPZ and the colleges, several corporate sponsors have committed their support. These include international companies such as computer giants HP along with Canadian based design software specialists, EngView Systems. They join major local companies like Motivate Publishing, Layout Middle East and Marketing Communication's Agency, Momentum, to provide prizes, organisation and judging. McGill says, 'with the involvement of these formidable sponsors and the guidance of Professor Wayman, the awards are highly reputable and will give all participating students tremendous recognition.'

The stated aim of the Gulf Pack Gulf Print awards is to motivate home grown talent, local art and graphic design. Apart from awarding individual achievement, the main prizes will be offered to the successful departments in participating institutions. 'We want to reward as many involved as possible by providing lasting recognition,' said McGill.

The awards comprise five categories including Poster Design, Book Design, Typography/ Font Design, Corporate Image and Packaging Design.

Commenting on behalf of Motivate Publishing, sponsors of the Book Design award, Simon O'Herlihy said that they chose to sponsor the award as they believe book designers are a rare breed. 'It is difficult to find talent in this field. We are interested not only in encouraging local artists to specialise in book design but also to welcome and encourage someone with talent in an internship opportunity at Motivate Publishing, to work alongside our book publishers.'

Joe Karkour, Area Manager, Layout Middle East fz llc, said that they were delighted to sponsor the Font Award. Main distributors for QuarkXPress products, Layout Middle East are keen to see what the local talent will bring to the field of typography. 'We are hoping to get excellent designs for a new font in Arabic which should be very interesting,' said Karkour.
He went on to say that Layout is always looking for young artists who can help create new waves of Arabic Calligraphy ensuring the diversity and good looks of Arabic Publications in the region.

HP Middle East's 'Imaging & Printing Group' (IPG), are sponsors of the Poster Design Award. Having recently launched new models targeting graphic designers and professional photographers, HP provides the opportunity for the participants to present their work using the best printing solutions available in the market.

The advice of Sherifa Hady, Marketing Manager for IPG, is for students to "Think BIG ! HP's large format solutions enable printing in photo quality allowing more time to design. HP strongly supports the graphic design industry in the Middle East and our initiatives aim to encourage local talent and creativity around the region.'

The Corporate Image Award will be sponsored by Marketing Communications Specialists, Momentum. Guy Taylor, Managing Director, said that 'sponsoring the awards underlines Momentum's commitment to local education and the community in which we work. We have been receiving on average 3 interns per year from various colleges, to help give them work experience and an opportunity to work alongside our designers and creative directors.'

'Sponsoring this award is one step further in our efforts to support local educational institutions and their students in understanding the needs of industry and to give them the encouragement they need to enter this highly competitive market,' Taylor said.

The packaging design awards have been sponsored by Canada's EngView Systems Corp. They were keen to support the event as the Gulf Pack Awards provided a platform to present their unique CAD/CAM design software applications exclusively created for the packaging design industry. EngView have generously donated two software packages, one for the winning college and one for the winning student.