A Curtin University student has flown to Sydney to begin a one-year paid internship at The Glue Society, a leading Australian creative agency.
Kate Davies, a third year creative advertising and graphic design student, was announced as one of four recipients of the 2016/17 Glue Society Fellowship in August, having triumphed over more than 120 other applicants, some with industry experience, for the coveted position.
The fellowship includes tuition in art direction, design, digital creativity, editorial craft and film from members of The Glue Society’s collective of writers, artists and directors, including esteemed creative luminary Jonathan Kneebone, at the Sydney-based studio.
“I’m really excited because this is such an incredible opportunity – both for me as a creative person and for my career. I’ll be able to work in the real world with real clients and real briefs on something that could actually go live,” says Davies.
“At the end, I want to have made some mistakes and learnt lessons from those, and I want to have a big notebook full of new ways of coming up with ideas and creative executions.”
Founded in 1998, The Glue Society is one of Australia’s most highly regarded creative agencies, boasting several awards from the Cannes Lions advertising festival, and having worked with clients as diverse as ALDI, headspace, Jet.com, Tropfest and Volkswagen.
However, their work spans more than just traditional advertising and includes other creative endeavours, such as art exhibitions, broadcast entertainment, film direction, graphic design, sculpture and video installations. In partnership with ANZ, for example, The Glue Society has been integral in the design of Sydney’s GAYTMs for the Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras.
Davies considers the fellowship, which will let her work on such projects, to be her biggest achievement since switching from a screen arts major in 2013, after realising she was “more interested in the development of ideas than production”, and credits her university tutors for helping to refine her creative skills that ultimately led to this opportunity.
“I would be so unprepared without this course. My tutors have been with me every step of the way, helping me make links between different words, different ideas and even different visuals, which you don’t think about when you’re doing a regular brainstorm,” she says.
The fellowship means she’ll have to postpone completing her degree – but she doesn’t mind if it means getting industry experience under her belt.
“The Glue Society seem to change up their clients, which I think is really good, in that I’m not going to do the same work over and over again,” she says.
“There’ll be different things that the clients will want – products, ideas or messages – and to think they could actually go out onto TV, radio or in the real world is so exciting.”
