It's hard to be a monitor of change but Jean Marcellino finds herself in just that position. When she graduated first in her Cooper Union class she was certain that advertising's combination of idea and image was right for her sort of talent, but her very first job in a female-run advertising agency raised doubts as to what role she could play. The time was the early sixties, and at Regina Ovesey Inc., "The executives wore hats all day long," Ms. Marcellino, now a VP/Senior AD at J. Walter Thompson, recalls, "They specialized in childrens' fashion," she noted, "and the president smoked a jewelled pipe."

"It wasn't that I didn't like advertising, but I didn't like that situation."

Though she speculates that recent entrants to the art direction field are split about 50/50 male-female, Ms. Marcellino remembers her days as a senior art director and designer at CBS, Columbia Records. She was the only woman in a department of twelve. The record industry, particularly in 1965, was the heart of the counterculture camp, she recalled, "It was the dawn of the hippie era. Columbia had Dylan, Joplin, Simon & Garfunkel." But on a deeper level, the advertising department at Columbia was a bastion of conventional thinking.

"One evening the members of our department did the unthinkable," she said with a laugh, "we all went out for drinks, without our boss, and confessed our salaries." Although she was affectionately known as 'the workhorse' and had departmental seniority, the horrible truth was, "I was the lowest paid person in the department." When she confronted her boss with these facts and figures he proceeded to justify the salary decisions with 'Joe's son is in college,' and 'Steve has a mortgage on a new house,' etc. "It seems like ancient history," Ms. Marcellino says, "but, the worst part about it is that I bought it."

Jean Marcellino is a determined woman, however. After leaving Columbia Records to raise her family and freelance, she gave the record field another chance. This time it was Arista Records. During her three years there she had but one purpose: to get out of records and into advertising. She had a portfolio full of record advertisements and record album covers, but was in love with an IBM ad. She refused to accept the industry wisdom that she was 'a record person.'

"My portfolio was so heavy, I couldn't get it off the ground," she said. But she was able to carry it to a former Arista employee who had become a headhunter for advertising agencies. "I went to her with this immense portfolio and said, 'I'll do anything you tell me to do.' I wanted to get into Lord Geller Federico Einstein, Scali McCabe Sloves, or Ammirati & Puris."

The out pile grew sky high and the in pile dwindled to those of her record pieces that were most conceptual. "I could see the wisdom," Ms. Marcellino recalls. It worked. She was invited to see Dick Thomas, then creative director at Lord Geller Federico Einstein. She admires him still, and not only for the chance he took on her. "He is a daring man. He doesn't fall into the conventions that affect other people. He often hired people- illustrators and photographers- to work outside of their established specialties."

He made a deal with her that has an almost fairytale quality: in exchange for one year on Avon books, an account that played off her record-launch expertise, she would get future opportunities to work on other accounts. "Almost one year later, to the day, he said, 'Ok, you've done your time," she recalled. Then she began to work on the prince of accounts, IBM. "It was another one of those daring moves he's capable of. I used to tell people that I would go there everyday for nothing," she said, "I had a wonderful time."

Jean Marcellino separates art direction into art and craft elements. "Into the art category," she observes, "falls the concept, the persuasive aspect of advertising. That's clearly where it's at if you had to make a choice between the art and craft elements." Unfortunately, she feels many people have made such a choice. "A lot of what's going on today in print is a disaster. The art is important, but lets not dump the craft," she said. "The craft represents visual refinements whose absence is felt. There are kids here, right out of art school, who can't name a typeface, can't specify type, and have no sense of scale. It's sad to have to tolerate a lot of ugliness to see what the idea is."

It's the old print versus television dichotomy which, like the old feminism argument, finds itself embodied in Jean Marcellino. Despite the emphasis away from print noodling in favor of the entertaining idea, "It's rare to find a television commercial that has a good concept," said Ms. Marcellino, who judges the Clios each year looking for them.

Nevertheless Jean Marcellino, determined, seeks support from industry valedictorians. In this case she pulls a clipping, absolutely yellow with age, from her J.W.T. bulletin board. Circled in red, from a Times interview with Ed McCabe, this quote, "Brilliant, creative advertising is one of the last remaining legal things you can use to gain an unfair advantage over your competition," continues to inspire the lady.