Cutters Studios and its design division Flavor were among four post houses that came away with top awards from the AICE Awards gala presentation in New York last Friday – one of them being “Best of Chicago” for an IBM spot edited by Michael Lipper for VSA Partners.
The other companies that each won three awards were Cut+Run/London and LA, Rock Paper Scissors/Santa Monica and Umlaut/San Francisco.
Cutters Studios won in the Comedy category, for Oscar Mayer’s “Giving Thanks” for mcgarrybowen, edited by Grant Gustafson. Flavor was the winner in the Design category for the AICP “Show Opener,” created for the AICP Show in Chicago last year.
Cutters partner/executive producer is co-president of the International Board of Directors, with Rachelle Madden of Poetica, New York.
At the gala, awards were presented in 30 categories: 21 technique, media and product categories and nine awards presented to the best work from each of AICE’s nine regional chapters, Boston, chicago, Dallas, Detroit, LA, Minneapolis New York, San Francisco and Toronto. See the winners’ list here.
This year marked the introduction of the Best in Show award, selected by the AICE Curatorial Committee (of which Optimus’ Craig Lewandowski is a member) from among the 21 main competition category winners. The Committee is a group of 13 artists at AICE member companies, who represent a cross-section of disciplines, crafts and regions.
Also new were two new categories: Alternative Media (over 90 seconds), and Online Campaign, to recognize work created specifically for online distribution.
The awards gala, hosted by AICE’s New York chapter, included a salute to outgoing executive director Burke Moody, who steps down May 30 after 17 years of service to AICE, eight as its executive director. The John Palestrini of the Lively Group was inducted into the AICE Hall of Fame at the event.
