Protest against gender bias
Dressed in black, about 40 feminist protesters waved placards outside a glitzy Auckland design awards ceremony, highlighting gender inequality in the industry.
Best Design Awards held on Saturday night, and hosted by the Designers Institute of New Zealand, are New Zealand’s biggest design awards.
While event attendees were arriving and sipping early-evening cocktails at the Viaduct Events Centre, the 40/3 protesters waved placards outside, protesting the gender inequality in the design award winners statistics.
Each year the Designers Institute of New Zealand awards two Black Pins, its supreme award.
In the past two decades 43 Black Pins have been awarded: 40 to men and 3 to women.
This statistic compelled New Zealand designer, typographer and artist Catherine Griffiths to design three protest posters.
40/3 protester and organiser Jade Tang-taylor said the evening was ‘‘family-friendly’’ and had a ‘‘positive energy’’. As nerve-wracking as it was to do, the protest was extremely important, she said.
‘‘Out of 43 black pins, 40 have been given to men despite 70 per cent of students being female,’’ she said.
‘‘There is an inequality there, young females can’t see themselves reflected at that level.
‘‘It’s crazy we are still having this conversation now in 2018,’’ she said.
Griffiths said New Zealand’s design community was thriving, diverse and innovative but the history of the Best Design Awards gave the impression that the best, brightest and most creative design talent is largely male.
Griffith’s 40/3 posters resulted in a strong response from the design community, which lead to the protest group Designers Speak (Up).
‘‘The objective of the campaign is to encourage not only meaningful change to the processes that have led to gender imbalance, but also to have those processes embrace cultural diversity,’’ she said.
Award winners notwithstanding, of the nine convenors of juries for judging the nine main categories, eight are men and one is a woman. Of the jurors and convenors combined, 46 are men and 15 are women.
The jury for ‘The Value of Design Award’ is made up of men only.
Feminist Action Auckland representative Katherine Mcalpine says the 40/3 campaign caught their attention immediately and they offered their support to raise awareness.
‘‘Our mandate is to promote equality across gender, ethnicity and all forms of marginalisation. One hundred and 25 years after New Zealand suffragists won the vote for New Zealand women, we proudly united in Designers Speak (Up)’s campaign for equity and equality,’’ Mcalpine said.
Protesters wanted to ‘‘ensure a message is heard, to express anger, and to reinforce the response of outrage provoked by Catherine Griffiths’ 40/3 protest posters,’’ she added.
Designers Speak (Up) are calling for a professional, independent audit of the processes of the Designers Institute of New Zealand. They also want to encourage a meaningful change to the processes that have led to gender imbalance, while embracing cultural diversity to make the future of design in New Zealand to be inclusive.
Designers Institute president Vee Kessner acknowledged the protest in her opening speech, saying that the industry organisation welcomed the dialogue.