Make your work loud: A call to action

As a woman born and raised in Romania, being subject to casual gender discrimination was second nature to me. In fact, it was so normalised that I never knew the gravity of it until I moved to the UK to pursue a career in film music. As I’m navigating the safer waters of Western inclusivity, I’m still coming to terms with the dated views that, not too long ago, I had to accommodate by making myself small and quiet both as a woman and as a composer.

Historically, composition is one of the many professions that have been unfairly reserved for men. As technology advanced, composition branched out into many new territories, becoming an adjacent medium for visual storytelling. But the craft remained as biased as always. Today, as the artificial construct of traditional gender roles is disintegrating, women have more opportunities to choose to be composers. However, due to the lack of representation in the industry, many of them are not even aware of this option.

According to Women and Hollywood, only 6% of composers working on the top 250 grossing films of 2019 were women. The same publication states that a gender ratio of 68.8 males to every 1 female composer worked on the top-grossing 1200 films from 2007-2018. A bit intimidating, right? We are currently nurturing a new generation of creatives based on values such as inclusivity, diversity and equality that the top of the industry does not yet fully reflect.

But I am not here to tell you that the film industry isn’t equal – to a certain extent, we all know that already. 

When I was accepted into a Film Music residency for female composers aimed at addressing the gender gap in the industry, part of me was embarrassed to go. At the time, it felt like I was furthering my career and 'getting ahead' on account of simply being a woman – which would be unfair. It took me so long to understand that I wasn’t getting ahead of my male counterparts, I was merely catching up. It’s that simple.

I met many male composers throughout my life. But, by the time I finally met a female film composer, I had already scored my first feature-length film. For a long while, I didn’t have any guidance on navigating a male-dominated industry. I had no one to tell me that I would feel like an outsider in a roomful of men, even as an expert in my field. 

I quickly learned that being a female film composer is a small act of social activism in itself. And so is fulfilling any other film-related professional role that is conventionally ascribed to men. I wondered: As a beginner, would I have wanted to become a film composer had I known the odds were stacked against me? Probably not. But would I have been inspired to see examples of women excelling at it? Definitely. 

A few years back, I started showcasing my music as part of an online portfolio to get the paid work that I desperately needed. It felt so selfish and strange to be occupying a (virtual) space with only myself and the work I had done; almost as if I didn't deserve to have a small corner of the Internet for myself.

As I built up the courage, I started sharing teasers of my music on social media: 30 seconds here, a minute there, until I found myself promoting full releases. The fact that I was mentioning my collaborators always made it easy. That way, I wasn’t only doing it for myself and it didn’t feel as selfish.

Since my Instagram account has been up, I’ve had a lot of people reaching out with kind, encouraging words. After having lived in a hypercritical society for most of my life, these words healed and comforted me. I connected with so many like-minded people just because I had the strength to ignore an instinct that was deeply rooted in generations of women before me: the instinct to be quiet. A whole new world of emerging creatives was opened to me as I became part of a collective built on shared values, shared struggles, and complete understanding. But only after having made my work visible.

More than anything, I focused on the few humble messages that called my work inspiring; people who wrote about me being there and doing it, and how seeing that made their own goals seem more achievable. I don’t claim to have had a colossal impact on anyone’s career, but I’ll settle for having provided one small piece in the immense puzzle that constitutes someone’s motivation. And, to me, that is reason enough to be visible. 

That is why we need to start seeing representation not as this veiled mystery that is decided at the top of the industry, unaffected by our individual actions, but as something that is addressable right now. Technology has been offering a way of challenging the status quo and it’s time for us to take it. It’s simple and elegant: make yourself visible, make yourself known.

Aspiring creatives deserve visible examples of underrepresented professionals at all stages of their careers so that it can become a tangible goal. We need you to be present, we need you to be loud. We need you to voice your challenges and display your successes. As that motivational caption on social media says: be the person you needed when you were starting out.

So, if you’re ever stopping yourself from giving your work the showcase it deserves due to lack of confidence or motivation, then let this be your incentive: by making yourself visible, you are contributing to the shaping of a new, unseen generation of creatives, to whom equality and diversity are one step closer, as a result of your hard work.

This is not a success story, this is a call to action. And, above all, this is a reminder that the work you do matters.