Daniel Correa of alma: “We Wanted to Turn Gun Violence Statistics Into Something People Could See and Feel”

With Change the Ref, we’re always looking for ways to bring the conversation around gun violence into culture, and the World Cup gave us perhaps the biggest cultural stage in the world to do that.

We see statistics about gun violence every day, but numbers can often become part of the landscape and lose their impact. With “Statiums,” we wanted to transform those statistics into something people could actually see and feel.

By translating the lives lost to gun violence into empty seats in stadiums and placing that message in the context of the World Cup, the statistic suddenly becomes something very real and difficult to ignore. I think that’s really what it’s about: not just sharing information, but finding a different way to present it and make people feel it.

Winning a Lion for this work feels especially meaningful this year. Print & Publishing was highly selective, awarding only 13 Lions, so having “Statiums” recognized demonstrates that simple, powerful ideas can still stand out.

It is also the sixth different Change the Ref campaign we’ve had recognized in Print at Cannes over the past seven years. Beyond the awards, I think that consistency shows us that we’re on the right track.

It also speaks to the importance of having a client who trusts creativity and gives us the space to keep finding new ways to talk about the same urgent issue, keep it relevant within culture, and make it harder to ignore.