Kuala Lumpur – Awarded copywriter, filmmaker and executive creative director of Leo Burnett KL, Yasmin Ahmad, passed away last Saturday evening, July 25, from complications following a stroke. She was only 51 years old.
Earlier reports said that late Thursday, Ahmad collapsed in the middle of a presentation at TV3’s studio in Kuala Lumpur and fell into a coma. Despite brain surgery, her condition deteriorated. She died, close to Saturday midnight, at the Damansara Specialist Hospital.
In accordance with Malaysian tradition, she was buried the next day in Subang Jaya. Her husband Abdullah Tan Yew Leong, their families as well as hundreds of fans, friends, industry colleagues and personalities were in attendance.
In life, Ahmad was the most prominent face of Malaysia’s advertising industry.
After a short stint as a pianist, a singer and an IBM marketing representative, Ahmad began her career in advertising as copywriter at Ogilvy & Mather. Winning a number of international awards raised her creative profile, and eventually, she transferred to Leo Burnett. There, she gained even more fame as the creative mind behind the advertising of Petronas, Celcom and the Singaporean Ministry of Community Development, Youth and Sports.
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YASMIN AHMAD WITH TAN HONG MING
Writing and directing many of the Petronas ads herself (the most recent of which was “Tan Hong Ming in Love”), she discovered her passion for film. This led to a concurrent career as a feature film director. Her critically-acclaimed movies included “Rabun “, “Sepet”, “Gubra”, “Mukhsin”, Muallaf” and “Talentime”.
Perhaps it was premonitory that the most recent addition to her portfolio was “Funeral” for Singaporean Ministry of Community Development, Youth and Sports. She was also working on “Go, Thaddeus!” the story of Singaporean triathlete Thaddeus Cheong, who died after finishing a SEA Games selection race in 2007.
