In just a few weeks, the UK’s Women Of The Lens Film Festival kicks off at Goldsmiths Curzon, London. The festival was created to showcase the work and challenge perceptions of Black women and women of color both in front of and behind the camera.
The representation of Black women and women of color overall in the creative industries remains disturbingly low. During the festival, women of color who do work in the film industry will be sharing their stories. Over the course of three days, the festival will include 54 productions, 14 Themes, and five panels of debates, hosted at two historic venues.
Women Of The Lens Festival creator Jennifer G Robinson tells ShineMyCrown,
“…Audiences are getting far more discerning about what they watch as film, the likes of Netflix and HBO are evidence of this. I’m excited by this as it means that Women Of The Lens Film Digital Broadcast Festival is well placed to meet the developing needs of audiences as they seek out films which have more variety and diversity of story. People just don’t want to be patronised anymore and want films
which educate, entertain and draw on their emotions. Women Of The Lens will provide an experiential event for the films which have been programmed – many of the filmmakers will be in attendance and audiences will be able to join in the interviews which get to the nugget of directorial choices. The Festival dampens the idea that women, women of colour making film in Britain doesn’t exist!
Through educating, the Festival provides panel discussions that show how life and film live off each other. So for example, we have panel discussions which look at the representation of mental health issues in film (Friday 24th November). Our panel will chow-down on how we’ve come to these often harmful depictions of mental health and to find ways of improving.”
You can purchase your tickets to the festival by clicking here.
