Sarah Hanley's talk sparked something in me. Touching upon the sheer fact that design was once a primarily male world, Hanley spoke of how women have began to find their own feet in the environment, and how more and more women were becoming creative directors. Reiterating what she said, it wasn't enough to just be a designer in the industry.
Whilst I was researching my contextual studies essay on print media and the way print has changed due to the reliance of computers and the digitalisation of media as a whole, I came across an interview with the author of Print is Dead. Long Live Print, Ruth Jamieson. The book showcases 53 publications and celebrates the rise of indie magazines. Within the interview Jamieson was asked what was the most surprising aspect of her research. Her answer was about women in the industry, explaining: "Aside from being constantly blown away by the creativity of the magazine makers I met, one of the most encouraging things I discovered was just how many women are involved in the rebirth of print. Women are in senior positions. They are creative directors, editors, art directors, publishers. At a time when we’re increasingly aware of the lack of female voices in the media and other positions of influence, I found this incredibly heartening. I hope it’s a sign of things to come. And I hope that the same will happen with other poorly represented groups."
I began to think more in depth on the roles women play in the industry. I think it is quite clear that the environment is more focal on men -- out of many industry talks I have attended, only one has featured a female. So I decided to research the subject itself, out of necessity. I needed to know that I could succeed and that my gender would not hold me back.
One such interview I came across was an article featuring Rebecca Wright, a programme director of graphic communication design at Central Saint Martins, University of the Arts in London. In HE courses up and down the country with students arriving and returning to study undergraduate and postgraduate design, the majority are female. There is a domination of females studying creative courses, and this is apparent at Central Saint Martins itself. Out of the 525 students enrolled in 2014 on BA Graphic Design, 372 were female: a huge 70.8%. This was similar on MA Communication Design, where it's class was 68.3% female. Whilst design education appears to be dominated by women, it's in fact reversed within the design industry.
With these stats at hand, Design Council's survey of the UK design industry in 2010 revealed that only 40% of designers were women. This caused an uproar, spurring a huge debate on the subject. Despite this, there is little explanation of these numbers and though we understand their significance, we do not truly understand how they have happened.
These stats show that gender imbalance in the industry is visible. Women are less represented: and in an industry where it is important to find an audience in all demographics, with that lack of representation, design and advertising may not be reaching and communicating with women as well as they could. Rebecca Wright explains that this is due to the industry. Whilst education strives to be equal, create a healthy competition and recognise the value of talent and graft, the industry rewards confidence and charisma. In basic terms, in order to succeed, you need to be able to self promote, to be slightly arrogant and really push yourself forward. The unfortunate truth is that these attributes do not always sit as comfortably with women.
Women are as skilled as men -- and there is great design in women, as shown on this blog, women of graphic design, which is a project focused on exhibiting the contributions of women in graphic design. There is no divide between the quality men and women are creating. But after Rebecca Wright's 15+ years in design education, her experience has found that female students are less likely to want to grab the limelight, are less inclined to push themselves forward and to self promote. Female confidence is shown in other ways: events, group work they often lead, and the imagination and innovation with which they will develop their project work. The lack of fanfare that accompanies these types of activities is the most logical explanation of why women graphic designers are less visible in the industry.
This is something that resonates strongly with me. I find it quite difficult to push myself forward: whilst many of the boys in my class have already held placements, the girls are in fact lagging behind. We don't seem to believe we are ready, we don't have the confidence to promote ourselves and push ourselves forward. I think it's interesting to have a possible answer as to why it is so difficult, and why we don't seem to hear of many women's names in design.
I have decided to make it my own goal to self promote myself as well as my male counterparts in order to succeed. Recognising this problem in myself is the first step. I want to create personal targets, such as making my social media platforms stronger, and finally getting myself a placement before the end of the summer and my final year of university. I recently created a post on creative cv's and the importance of self branding, and I want to use this to create my own. My final module before I leave my foundation degree is to create a portfolio exhibiting my best work. Something I want to include is a booklet, based on me as a person: I feel this could be used as my CV, and once completed, would be a nice way of catching the attention of possible employers and placements.
It's nice to know that no one blames the quality of women's work as to their lack of representation in the industry: but the probable reason why is an uncomfortable fact. I do feel that if this was more spoken about within education, women would feel more inclined to push ourselves and change this inequality.
