Attention, a global social media agency that is an arm of KBS, has hired Asif Khan, Tim Gunatilaka, and Ben Krantz as VP/strategy & analytics, director of content, and creative director, respectively.
“Asif, Tim and Ben all have deep social and content roots but provide a broader purview of the marketing landscape, which is important to us as we continue to innovate for and with our clients,” said president of Attention, Tom Buontempo.
Kahn will be responsible for bringing a fresh perspective to Attention’s strategy and creative team, and showing the agency how data and creativity are inextricably linked. Prior to joining Attention, Khan led the strategy department at VICE Media’s Carrot Creative where he played an instrumental role in winning several pieces of new business, including Chipotle as its first ever-social AOR and several Unilever brands. He is also responsible for building the Carrot Strategy team from 3 to 15 members. Before joining Carrot, Asif held various strategy roles at branding, experiential and digital agencies after first starting his career in market research.
Gunatilaka’s background in journalism will allow him to bring an audience-first perspective to Attention’s storytelling capabilities. Previously, as associate director of content and social strategy at KBS, he helped launch the digital magazine IQ by Intel, among other branded content platforms. Before that, he served as head of content innovation at OMD where he oversaw GE’s foray into podcasts and virtual reality. Earlier in his career, he was a journalist for publications including Entertainment Weekly, SPIN and Paper Magazine.
Krantz has built a reputation for his ability to create authentic conversations and experiences for brands. As creative director at Attention, he is making an immediate impact on the creative department, including the agency’s own rebranding efforts. For nearly a decade, Krantz has led and developed groundbreaking campaigns across digital, social, traditional and experiential platforms for clients including Mercedes-Benz, American Express, Citibank and P&G. Previously, Krantz served as associate creative director at Tribal Worldwide and Publicis.
Attention recently launched an L.A.-based influencer studio, Meat & Produce, dedicated to leveraging the craft of a raw creator base, fostering brand collaborations and helping the influencer community build a business around their talent.
Jules Feiffer, Pulitzer Prize-Winning Cartoonist and Writer, Dies At 95
Jules Feiffer, a Pulitzer Prize-winning cartoonist and writer whose prolific output ranged from a long-running comic strip to plays, screenplays and children's books, died Friday. He was 95 and, true to his seemingly tireless form, published his last book just four months ago.
Feiffer's wife, writer JZ Holden, said Tuesday that he died of congestive heart failure at their home in Richfield Springs, New York, and was surrounded by friends, the couple's two cats and his recent artwork.
Holden said her husband had been ill for a couple of years, "but he was sharp and strong up until the very end. And funny."
Artistically limber, Feiffer hopscotched among numerous forms of expression, chronicling the curiosity of childhood, urban angst and other societal currents. To each he brought a sharp wit and acute observations of the personal and political relations that defined his readers' lives.
As Feiffer explained to the Chicago Tribune in 2002, his work dealt with "communication and the breakdown thereof, between men and women, parents and children, a government and its citizens, and the individual not dealing so well with authority."
Feiffer won the United States' most prominent awards in journalism and filmmaking, taking home a 1986 Pulitzer Prize for his cartoons and "Munro," an animated short film he wrote, won a 1961 Academy Award. The Library of Congress held a retrospective of his work in 1996.
"My goal is to make people think, to make them feel and, along the way, to make them smile if not laugh," Feiffer told the South Florida Sun Sentinel in 1998. "Humor seems to me one of the best ways of espousing ideas. It gets people to listen with their guard down."
Feiffer was born on Jan. 26, 1929, in the Bronx. From... Read More