Young Guns is an awards competition that identifies and celebrates today's vanguard of young creatives. The programme is open to creatives aged 30 and under who have been working for at least two years, full-time or freelance. Eligible entrants can submit a combination of professional and personal work, says The One Club.


The One Club says programme branding and design of the Young Guns Cube award itself are reimagined each year by a past Young Gun winner. This year's YG23 branding was created by Khyati Trehan (YG19), a graphic designer and 3D visual artist originally from New Delhi and now based in New York.

 

"The YG23 visual identity draws from what all winners share: a restless, hands-on spirit that keeps them moving and pushes them past the obvious," says Trehan. "It's a telltale sign that they're going places, and the branding channels that momentum."


The wordmark is simply letterforms posing as wheels, and the mark is modular: snapping into a tight square of four or stretching into a line when needed, says the awards.   

 

The key visual is rooted in a design school assignment Trehan loved: cutting squares out of animation keyframe strips and rearranging them in an eight-by-eight grid to create compositions that had visual rhythm, adds The One Club.  

 

"I revisited that exercise and 'vibe coded' a tool that turned the animations into ASCII art," Trehan says. "The identity comes together to feel hands-on — think quick DIY flyers — as if I grabbed the first stack of colored paper from the stationery shop and dove straight into making."

 

The competitions regularly attract entries from upwards of 45 countries, with more than half coming from outside the US. The One Club says winners will be selected by a jury made up of past Young Guns winners and other creative leaders, to be announced shortly.

 

Levine/Leavitt, a long-time YG partner, will once again offer its Artists-in-Residence Award, in which the artist rep firm provides one YG winner with a full year of artist and career management representation, says The One Club. 

 

Also continuing this year is the Levine/Leavitt Young Guns Assistance Programme, open to illustrators and photographers who qualify for YG23 but may not have the means to enter with ease. Successful applicants receive free entry into the competition courtesy of Levine/Leavitt, says the awards. 

 

The One Club says all Young Guns winners receive a unique version of the iconic Young Guns Cube, designed exclusively for this year's incoming class, and have their permanent profile page added to the Young Guns website.  

 

Winners also receive a complimentary one-year One Club for Creativity membership, permanent membership in the Young Guns network, a chance to be featured in Young Guns events and an assortment of career-boosting opportunities from Young Guns sponsors, says The One Club. 

 

The One Club concludes that Young Guns 23 winners will be announced in December. 


For more information, visit www.youngguns.org. Follow the One Club for Creativity on Facebook, LinkedIn, X, Instagram, or on TikTok. 

*Image courtesy of contributor