Leadership
Charles Hodges
Founder, Executive Creative Director
Charles is inspired by people who want to change things. He founded Arts & Letters Creative Co. to be a home where talented people could partner with the world’s biggest dreamers to create ideas that do just that. He believes that the best ideas transcend advertising and become culture in their own right and that every idea has that potential if you’re willing to put in the effort. No stranger to transformative work, Charles began his career in New York as a copywriter at Wieden+Kennedy on Nike, ESPN, Heineken and Delta before departing to work at Google’s Creative Lab. Prior to founding Arts & Letters, Charles honed his approach for modern creative partnership as a Group Creative Director on Apple at TBWA\Media Arts Lab in Los Angeles where he led global creative efforts for iPhone.
Andy Grayson
Director of Strategy
At Arts & Letters, Andy can always be found espousing his firm belief that the best creative work comes from a place of provocative truth. It’s a trait that served him well at Wieden+Kennedy, where he directed strategy across all of Nike on global projects for Nike+, Nike Basketball, Nike Running, Nike Football, Nike Golf, and the Women’s World Cup. For Arts & Letters, Andy also combines this quest for the truth with agile process, drawing on his experience working with startups in San Francisco and Silicon Valley, and before that, redefining the strategic approach to the creative process as the Director of Brand Strategy for Goodby Silverstein & Partners in San Francisco.
Sara Kastner
HEAD OF TALENT
Sara is responsible for helping to drive initiatives across the leadership team, prioritizing and operationalizing key strategies across the entire company. She partners with Creative Leadership to help run the department, coaching talent and leading creative management and resourcing. In 2019, Sara joined the agency as the Director of Creative Operations, where she helped to shift the approach to creative management and implemented an approach to resourcing. During this time, she launched a freelance strategy to match A&L’s rapid growth. With 20+ years of industry experience at award-winning agencies like Fallon, Wieden+Kennedy, barrettSF and Barton F Graf, she has had the opportunity to work with top creative and business leaders, across a range of experience rooted in project management, creative operations and talent management.
Theo Abel
MANAGING DIRECTOR
Theo oversees all aspects of business operations, partnering with the Department and Discipline Leads to foster a world-class creative environment designed to facilitate strong partnerships with our clients, drive business and cultural impact with our work, and generate growth for the company and our talented group of employees. Prior to his appointment to MD, Theo served as the company’s Director of Operations, working to develop foundational and structural systems that strengthened both internal and external collaboration. He is an Arts & Letters “boomerang,” returning from DoorDash, where he helped expand their internal creative group. In his first tour at Arts & Letters, he served as a Group Business Director, helping build what has now become the company’s growing partnership with ESPN. Theo has over 15 years of experience in account management, honing his craft at Goodby Silverstein & Partners, The Martin Agency and Grey Group, leading initiatives for BMW, The NFL Network, Doritos, Adobe, BFGoodrich Tires, and 3M.
Molly Jamison
Executive Creative Director
Molly came to Arts & Letters after a decade working in New York as both an art director and a copywriter. She began her creative career at Barton F. Graf 9000 in New York, later moving on to Droga5 and Wieden + Kennedy New York. She’s made award-winning work for everything from Little Caesars pizza to Delta Airlines to Quilted Northern toilet paper. Before coming to A&L, she was a creative director at FIG working on Ketel One. And before becoming Executive Creative Director at Arts & Letters, she was a Creative Director on ESPN at, wouldn’t you know, Arts & Letters. She believes in the power of the seemingly dumb idea (and the super smart ones too).
Lisa Setten
HEAD OF PRODUCTION
Lisa brings more than two decades of experience to her role leading integrated production across all A&L client partnerships. Prior to Arts & Letters, Lisa was SVP, Executive Director of Integrated Production for MullenLowe US where she oversaw the seamless integration of the agency’s US production offices across brands such as Acura, Corona, E*TRADE, JetBlue and KFC. Before that, Lisa was the Head of Integrated Production at JWT New York, where she led a team of 100+ content creators. She also served as Head of Broadcast at BBH New York, where she led the production for partnerships like Sprite, Levi’s and Cadillac.