Rene Juan de la Cruz
Digital Creative Director, Designer and Video Artist
Brooklyn, NY, USA
917-755-9161
be.net/renedelacruz
I am a strategic creator of marketing solutions in all forms of emerging media, including social and mobile platforms, internet, interactive television and applications for public spaces, live events and brand experiences. My passion is to engage media in original and unexpected ways.
Work Experience
Ogilvy & Mather, DLC Group
Digital Creative Director
Part of the new business team of the agency as Digital Strategist, Creative and Designer. I am currently developing the new corporate branding of the agency, ranked #10 US Hispanic Agency by Ad Age on 2012.
August 2012
- Present
New York, New York, United States
Redbean Society
Director, Ideas & Innovation
Reporting to the CEO, my role consists in conceptualizing, co-strategize, design and direct the production of integrated advertising campaigns targeted to international, national and vertical markets.
Categories: Online Advertising, Social Media, Television, Web, Package Design, CRM, Cause Marketing.
Brands: Sara Lee’s Jimmy Dean, TAJÍN International, Chocolate Cortés, TavernDirect.com
Award: ChocolateCortes.com wins the 2010 WEBAWARD for Outstanding Achievement in Web Development. Food Industry Standard of Excellence.
Categories: Online Advertising, Social Media, Television, Web, Package Design, CRM, Cause Marketing.
Brands: Sara Lee’s Jimmy Dean, TAJÍN International, Chocolate Cortés, TavernDirect.com
Award: ChocolateCortes.com wins the 2010 WEBAWARD for Outstanding Achievement in Web Development. Food Industry Standard of Excellence.
January 2009
- June 2013
New York, New York, United States
Trixel, Inc.
Creative Director, Co-Founder
My partner and I founded this boutique agency to bridge the creative gap between communication and activation for advertising agencies and brands in need of digital and experiential solutions.
Categories: Digital, Mobile, Guerrilla, Branded Entertainment, Urban Interventions and Live events.
Brands: Wrigley’s Orbit and Eclipse brands, Peroni, BMW, DirecTV, Polar Ice Brewing Company, Grey Goose, Absolut Vodka, Bacardi, Hyatt and Caribe Vision (TV channel).
Categories: Digital, Mobile, Guerrilla, Branded Entertainment, Urban Interventions and Live events.
Brands: Wrigley’s Orbit and Eclipse brands, Peroni, BMW, DirecTV, Polar Ice Brewing Company, Grey Goose, Absolut Vodka, Bacardi, Hyatt and Caribe Vision (TV channel).
January 2007
- December 2008
New York, New York, United States
Ogilvy & Mather
Digital Creative Director
Reporting to the President, I was responsible for integrating digital media and emerging trends in innovative ways to enhance the competitive advantage of our clients. My department created groundbreaking multiplatform convergent solutions generating new revenue streams both for our partner brands and our business.
Categories: Interactive TV, Social TV, Web, Online advertising, Mobile and convergences among categories
Brands: American Express, R-G Premier Bank, Sears, Unilever, Motorola, Gillette, Kraft, Coors Light, Televicentro (TV Channel), Sony, YMCA.
Categories: Interactive TV, Social TV, Web, Online advertising, Mobile and convergences among categories
Brands: American Express, R-G Premier Bank, Sears, Unilever, Motorola, Gillette, Kraft, Coors Light, Televicentro (TV Channel), Sony, YMCA.
January 2003
- January 2007
Puerto Rico
Broadbang
Pepsi Cola International. New Media Consultant
In collaboration with the Chief Marketing Officer of Pepsi and his global team, I consulted in the area of digital marketing and multi-platform integration of the brand for 20 international markets, focusing on Music and Sports properties.
January 2000
- December 2002
New York, New York, United States
Oxygen
Digital Designer
While studying my masters at NYU, I was recruited by a teacher as an intern for the network’s Convergence Lab, the Think Tank in charge of transforming the TV experience to make it interactive via proprietary cutting edge applications and applying convergence with the web.
January 1999
- December 1999
New York, New York, United States
DLC Digital, De La Cruz Group
Digital Creative Director
In this role I was responsible for spearheading the first digital department in a Puerto Rico advertising agency. We integrated brands to the digital world and I am particularly proud of an e-commerce solution developed for Amigo Supermarkets that successfully introduced online retail shopping to the island.
Brands: Miller Brewing Company, Puerto Rico Telephone Company, Government of Puerto Rico.
Brands: Miller Brewing Company, Puerto Rico Telephone Company, Government of Puerto Rico.
January 1996
- December 1998
Puerto Rico
Ciudad De Las Artes Studio & Gallery
Graphic Design Director
Co-Founder / Graphic Design Director.
January 1996
- December 1998
Puerto Rico
BBDO
Art Director
January 1992
- December 1996
Puerto Rico
Education
New York University
Masters, Interactive Telecommunication - (ITP)
NYU, Tisch School of Arts, Interactive Telecommunications Program (ITP)
January 1998
- December 2000
New York, New York, United States
University Of Hartford
Bachelor in Arts, Graphic Design
Hartford Art School
January 1985
- December 1989
Hartford, Connecticut, United States
Parsons The New School For Design
Summer Studies Program in Italy
Art History and Design
June 1988
- July 1988
Rome, Italy
Languages
Spanish (Native),
English (Fluent),
Skills
Adobe Acrobat,
Adobe Fireworks,
Adobe Illustrator,
Adobe In Design,
Adobe Photoshop,
Flash,
Microsoft Power Point,
Wordpress,
Drupal,
Edirol Motion Dive,
Quicktime-Pro,
Scala,
Silvepop,
VJ-Fuse,
Wildfire App,
VIdeo Jockey aka VJ Demencia
http://vjdemencia.tumblr.com
René Juan de la Cruz-Napoli. Born in San Juan, Puerto Rico is a multimedia creative director and video jockey, specializing in creating visual experiences of urban scale and interactions that often integrate convergence between the digital and physical realms.
Locally and internationally known as “VJ Demencia”, his video art is characterized by graphic movements that progress as a hypnotic trance, with a decidedly optical and futuristic style. His narrative uses paradox to compare and raise issues of universal humanist court, his favorite subjects being peace, earth and the world of dreams, not without a little humor and a large dose of positivism.
Rene Juan is also a creative advertising professional who has spent the last decade breaking with traditional paradigms while redefining the possibilities of commercial communications in the interactive and experiential fields. His principle interests lie in the exploration and implementation of emerging medias such as interactive television, along with the creation and ideation of innovative applications, as his proprietary “Visual Mobile Unit (VMU)” an urban projection advertising medium.
VJ Demencia has been invited by Apple to provide “VJ Master Classes” in their emblematic Soho location in New York, becoming the first VJ recruited by Apple to demonstrate the visual mastery achievable when mixing creativity with technology.
VJ Demencia has a burning passion for electronic music and has, since 1998, performed live in New York, Miami, Mexico, Spain and Puerto Rico alongside DJs and musicians such as Paul van Dyk, Tiësto, Paul Oakenfold, Mauro Picotto, Christopher Lawrence, Max Graham, DJ Craze, Nortec’s Bostich, Robi Draco Rosa and Gustavo Cerati, among many others.
Rene Juan lives and works in New York, a city he considers his home, mostly because it serves as an inexhaustible source of ideas and inspiration for him as an artist.
René Juan de la Cruz-Napoli. Born in San Juan, Puerto Rico is a multimedia creative director and video jockey, specializing in creating visual experiences of urban scale and interactions that often integrate convergence between the digital and physical realms.
Locally and internationally known as “VJ Demencia”, his video art is characterized by graphic movements that progress as a hypnotic trance, with a decidedly optical and futuristic style. His narrative uses paradox to compare and raise issues of universal humanist court, his favorite subjects being peace, earth and the world of dreams, not without a little humor and a large dose of positivism.
Rene Juan is also a creative advertising professional who has spent the last decade breaking with traditional paradigms while redefining the possibilities of commercial communications in the interactive and experiential fields. His principle interests lie in the exploration and implementation of emerging medias such as interactive television, along with the creation and ideation of innovative applications, as his proprietary “Visual Mobile Unit (VMU)” an urban projection advertising medium.
VJ Demencia has been invited by Apple to provide “VJ Master Classes” in their emblematic Soho location in New York, becoming the first VJ recruited by Apple to demonstrate the visual mastery achievable when mixing creativity with technology.
VJ Demencia has a burning passion for electronic music and has, since 1998, performed live in New York, Miami, Mexico, Spain and Puerto Rico alongside DJs and musicians such as Paul van Dyk, Tiësto, Paul Oakenfold, Mauro Picotto, Christopher Lawrence, Max Graham, DJ Craze, Nortec’s Bostich, Robi Draco Rosa and Gustavo Cerati, among many others.
Rene Juan lives and works in New York, a city he considers his home, mostly because it serves as an inexhaustible source of ideas and inspiration for him as an artist.