Designers: The UN Needs YOU

Feeling helpless in the face of COVID-19?

Take a stand.

The United Nations needs your help.

The organization has put out an open brief seeking designers and artists to help disseminate public health messages across cultures, ages, languages, geographies and platforms.

“We are in an unprecedented situation and the normal rules no longer apply. We cannot resort to the usual tools in such unusual times,” UN secretary-general António Guterres said in an announcement.

“The creativity of the responses must match the unique nature of this crisis—the magnitude of the responses must match its scale.”

The UN is currently accepting submissions through April 14 focused on the following six critical areas:

1. Personal Hygiene

2. Hand-washing

3. Reducing facial touching

4. Respiratory hygiene

5. Staying home

1. Physical Distancing

2. Maintaining at least six feet (two meters) between yourself and others

3. Avoiding gatherings and groups

1. Know the Symptoms

2. Seeking medical care early if you have a fever, cough and difficulty breathing

3. Staying home if you feel unwell

1. Kindness Contagion

2. Resetting the narrative—highlighting the need for global and collective cooperation to face the pandemic

3. Inspiring and spotlighting acts of kindness, big and small

4. Promoting solutions for resilience and recovery

1. Myth-Busting

2. Combatting incorrect advice, conspiracy theories and xenophobia

1. Do More, Donate

2. The UN has established a COVID-19 Solidarity Response Fund to fuel the World Health Organization’s efforts—“the first, and only, way for individual donors and businesses to donate to WHO’s global response to this outbreak.” More info.

(For a deck with more on the above areas of focus, click here.)

The fine print:

1. “Bring your own magic to these key messages—a creative twist, a cultural quirk, an interpretation which helps amplify them to audiences not yet reached.”

2. So long as you’re 18 and not an employee or family member of TLNT (Talenthouse is helping to manage the project), you’re cleared to participate.

3. File types accepted: .ai, .psd, .gif, .mp4, Soundcloud audio files

4. Submit high-res, layered artwork files (so that translations can be made for the international audience, where applicable)

5. Include your name and applicable social media tags for attribution

6. Don’t use UN or World Health Organization logos in your work

7. Submissions are accepted in English, Spanish, French, Italian, Arabic, Portuguese, German, Hindi, Bengali, Malay, Thai, Japanese, Indonesian, Urdu, Swahili, Nigerian Pidgin, Yoruba and Turkish. If your submission includes non-English text, include an English translation

8. If your work includes WHO facts or figures, include the tag “Source: World Health Organization”

9. Share your submission online and tag it with @WHO @UN @UnitedNations @Talenthouse and use the hashtags

10. The terms: You retain ownership of the work, but grant the UN and supporters a nonexclusive, worldwide, royalty free license to use the submission for a one-year period.

A panel is reviewing submissions and will place work on a microsite for the public to download and use as the world collectively fights COVID-19. (The members of the official selection panel have not yet been announced.) The subsequent campaign will be disseminated across UN, Talenthouse, Ello and other channels. According to Talenthouse, the selection criteria is “based on creativity (40%), originality (30%) and overall understanding of the theme (30%).”

As Talenthouse writes, “It is not too late. No one can do everything, but everyone can do something. Together, we can save lives, protect resources and care for each other.”

For more, visit Talenthouse. And if you’re ready to submit, you can do so here. Final selections will be made by April 30.

#COVID19 #Opencall #Talenthouse #UnitedNations