Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Xavi Ocana. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.
Xavi, appreciate you joining us today. Can you share an important lesson you learned in a prior job that’s helped you in your career afterwards?
There are moments for creative greatness and moments for creative learning. The sooner you embrace this, the sooner you’ll be on your path to growth. As creatives, our job is not to be better but to learn better.
Xavi, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?
Hola! My name is Xavi Ocana and I’m an Art Director.
I was always obsessed with the process of communication, with getting messages across. At the beginning of my career, that obsession took me to college, where I became a journalist. During my love affair with words, I always cheated with art. Straight out of college, I worked as editor-in-chief of art magazines for several years until I decided to give up cheating and get serious about art.
I moved to Mexico to study Art Direction at Miami Ad School and that’s how I was introduced to the dark side: advertising. I’m not sure if the force was always with me. Still, I was lucky enough to travel around the world and cross paths with extremely talented people at agencies like McCann Madrid, AKQA Tokyo, Saatchi & Saatchi New York, VMLY&R and MullenLowe (my current playground). Through my creative journey, I’ve had the opportunity to work for brands like Coca-Cola, Grey Goose and PATRÓN.
Let’s talk about resilience next – do you have a story you can share with us?
Graduating in June 2020, only a few months into a global pandemic, felt quite challenging. Especially if you add the fact that a few days before my graduation day, I discovered that my student visa would expire exactly 30 days after my graduation. This meant I had a little over 30 days to either find a job that would sponsor me, apply for an O1-B visa proving that I was a creative of ‘extraordinary ability,’ or pack my bags and move back to Spain (which would have made my mother extremely happy). Saying goodbye to New York was never an option (sorry, mom!) and finding a job could take several weeks in the best-case scenario, so the decision was easy: I had 30 days to become an immigration expert and apply for an O1 visa. It was easier said than done. Luckily, while in Ad school, I participated in multiple international advertising awards and was fortunate enough to win some. Little I knew that all those sleepless nights to meet all those insane deadlines would become my real chance to stay and work in the US. Preparing a visa application of over 700 pages in a month is still one of my biggest achievements in and out of advertising.
Do you think there is something that non-creatives might struggle to understand about your journey as a creative? Maybe you can shed some light?
I think non-creatives may have difficulty understanding that being productive is not always related to working. A crucial part of the work happens outside ‘work.’ In the creative process, what you take in is as important as what you put out. The number of hours you spend in front of your computer is just as valuable as the number you spend away from it: reading a book, attending a concert, visiting a museum, talking to other creatives, etc. That is work too. You are absorbing. Good creatives take very seriously nurturing their creativity and actively caring for their inspiration.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.xaviocana.com
- Instagram: @xaviocana
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/xaviocana
- Twitter: @xaviocana