Could you first briefly introduce yourself?
Where were you born,
where did you grow
up, what sort of education did you have
and how did you get
involved in the creative industries?
My name is Christopher
Guinness and I hail from the
southern-most
Caribbean
island of Trinidad and Tobago. I grew up drawing, painting and experimenting in all
sorts of visual art disciplines
which eventually lead me to
pursuing studies in animation at Sheridan College in
Ontario, Canada.
You have worked for
two leading advertising agencies,
first as a graphic artist
at McCann-Erickson
and later as an art director at Saatchi and
Saatchi. How did you
get in these competitive positions?
The job at McCann I was offered
by the creative director. I had
created a piece of animation
which caught his eye and was
subsequently used by one of
their clients for the FIFA World
Cup. I had no plans of entering
advertising but the opportunity seemed interesting and,
not unimportantly, the girls
there were cute. After spending some time at ME and beginning to feel a little creatively
stagnant I interviewed for a job
at Saatchi. A week into the job
they lost their biggest client in
a competitive pitch
which was prior to my arrival.
As a result they had to let go
a portion of their staff. At this
point Leizelle, my wife at the
time, and I were thinking, bad
move, coming to Saatchi and
Saatchi. But we rallied with the
company, won the fi