Hasta La Creative!

Saatchi & Saatchi’s New Directors Showcase at the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity is known for its splashy intros, but opened this year’s installment on Thursday with a curiously heady note.

Famed evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins took the stage to give a lecture, of sorts, on the subject of memes, which he introduced in his 1976 book “The Selfish Gene.” He spoke on how the transmission of ideas and cultural norms evolve in a way similar to natural selection, and how memes as we know them today are creative, intentional mutations.

Things took a weirder turn when the stage backdrop became a crazy display of meme-ified images, including that of Mr. Dawkins himself, accompanied by a song from musician Finn McNicholas and instrument designer Tim Exile. Mr. Dawkins then joined in on the fun and played a solo on an electronic wind instrument.

Continue reading at AdAge.com