Alkemy X has added director Alexander Maxwell to its roster for U.S. commercial representation. As a founding member of The Mill’s live-action offering, Maxwell spent over a decade with the creative studio, evolving to become a go-to director at the studio for performance-driven storytelling, with his natural curiosity sparking authentic performances in actors and real people across his entire reel of work.
Maxwell’s background includes NYU’s Film program, then a move to the commercial production space while continuing to hone his creative aesthetic with indie film projects on the side. Among his credits are lifestyle content for the likes of IKEA, AT&T and Sleep Number, comedy for Progressive and Hot Pockets, and high-end brand work for American Express, Lexus and Verizon. In his personal work, Maxwell focuses on the central narrative of human aspiration, honor and integrity, and hubris. He is fascinated by the role environments–both natural and industrial–play in the human search for self-knowledge, and his cinematic universe is characterized by a surreally elevated, dreamlike quality.
Alkemy X EP Nick Pitcavage said, “Alex is the type of director that transcends a category. Sure, he has car work in his reel, he’s got transition work, great storytelling, lifestyle and visual effects integration work. But those categories don’t define him. He’s one of those filmmakers who overdelivers in whatever category he’s challenged with. He has a careful approach to each new piece of creative that he sees, which results in a story that you can’t look away from. We see many opportunities for him to direct multidisciplinary pieces of creative and continue his involvement into the postproduction side when it’s appropriate to do so. Alex expands our roster and our brand further into what boundary-pushing, integrated production looks like,”
Maxwell added, “The collaborative and creative culture that has been established at Alkemy X is something that really excites me. It’s the perfect fit for my style of directing. Here I have the ability to use any of the tools within our industry to advance the stories I want to tell.”
Born and raised in California to Argentinian parents, Maxwell is fluent in Spanish. He has stewarded may projects from ideation through directorial output and delivery. Outside of commercials, Maxwell’s independent films explore his propensity for exploration beyond his own environment, with shorts earning him numerous accolades, celebration on the film festival circuit, and amassing millions of views online. He is currently finishing development of a feature script based on his narrative short “Yellow,” which earned the Best Short Film award at the New York City International Film Festival and screened at Cannes.
Forsman & Bodenfors Shifts Its Singapore Group Creative Director Ivan Guerra to Its NYC Hub
Forsman & Bodenfors (F&B) has expanded its creative leadership in New York by relocating longtime group creative director Ivan Guerra from the Singapore office to the Big Apple to support a quickly growing list of new client wins.
As a group creative director in Singapore, Guerra racked up numerous accolades and participated in a myriad of new business wins that fueled the agency’s growth year over year. He explained why now was the right time to come back to the states, adding more nuance in the process. ”Singapore is the business hub of Asia, New York is the business hub of the world,” he said. “Our office in Singapore was small when I arrived. Since then, we’ve more than tripled in size, and became the [number one] most creative agency in the country, and work with more and bigger clients than ever before. There’s always more to be done, but the agency I’m leaving behind is in fantastic shape and ready to take on the world, as I know they will.”
For Guerra, there’s an opportunity to replicate in New York the success he had in Singapore. During his career, he repositioned and promoted businesses and products across a wide variety of markets and industries including P&G, Coca-Cola and Booking.com. Some of his well-known work includes a campaign that increased Samsung’s sales in the Middle East by almost 200%, one of the most iconic films in the history of Converse, Verizon’s most successful sports partnership program “Data Dunk” with the NBA, and a “Proud Whopper” campaign in 2014 that reignited Burger King and garnered 13 Cannes Lions and a Grand Clio.
Coming back to New York after 15 years in the business, including a stint where he spent time at the likes of top-shelf agencies like R/GA,... Read More