Photographer: Jared Beck
Daniel Pollock and his team at Jane the Agency approached me to take part - and I couldn't think of anything more fun than a celebration of Janes. Really, it's about time.
Anonymity poster designs which were AGDA Award finalists.
The Council's 2017 conference has a theme of value and I was invited to presented a paper on the value of gender equity indesign awards, titled Anonymity: measuring the visibility of women in deisgn awards.
Abstract
This article measures and evaluates the visibility of women in Australian graphic design, through their presence and experiences in the AGDA (Australian Graphic Design Association) Awards. Positioning gender equity as a critical value in the graphic design industry, it also establishes the AGDA Awards as an integral way for designers to gain this visibility as authors of their work. This paper hypothesises that women have low visibility, in comparison to men, and that actions can be taken to remedy this gendered anonymity. Through collating the gender of every winner and juror in the AGDA Awards, this research demonstrates that levels of gender equity in the industry can be evaluated objectively. Similarly, it shows that identifying issues impacting the visibility of women on award platforms, felt by women in established design careers, can provide insights that lead to improving gender equity in the industry. Building on methodologies inspired by Marie Neurath’s contribution to the ‘Isotype Transformer’ process, this research analyzes, selects, orders and makes visible the AGDA Award data set. The findings that surface during this process, conclusively show that women are – on average and consistently – only 25 per cent of winners and judges in the AGDA Awards. However, through an evaluation of these shortfalls alongside the inclusion of interviews with women, deemed significant contributors to Australian graphic design by their peers, findings show how equitable visibility can be achieved through a series of measured and purposeful initiatives.
Sarah Naaden and Yianni Kourounis, facilitating the 'Where Neurons Connect' symposium, November 2017 in Melbourne
Pretending he couldn’t remember the MC’s name, Tansel Ali, a memory champion, took to the stage to give the first presentation at Friday nights symposium, in Melbourne. Encouraging the audience to use the event to connect with people, he also seemed to challenge everyone that it was child’s play to memorise a 200-page book in 10 minutes. He presented himself as a jolly ring master who could make any one in the room perform like Todd Sampson, who he coached to memorise a deck of cards front to back and back to front on his TV show ‘Design my Brain’.
I was starting to realise that even though I have two stomachs (one for mains and one for dessert) I may have two or more brains to match.
Jane Strangward followed Tansel on stage to unpack more about neuro science. She began by explaining the M-Brain – the multiple brain – and the science of the head, the heart and the gut. I was starting to realise that even though I have two stomachs (one for mains and one for dessert) I may have two or more brains to match. Strangward showed diagrams of the vegus nerve which physically makes the connection between the three brains that link our intuitions and feelings with rational thought. She elaborated that there are ways to connect these three brains to make the best type of decisions, that everyone can learn.
Next Lisa Grocott, a professor at Monash University a leader of the Wonder Lab, shared a traumatic story of giving a public speech as a child that had left her feeling humiliated. As well as getting the whole audience on board at an empathetic level, she used this relatable experience to demonstrate the effectiveness of her participatory workshops. Showing slides of ‘Play Mobile’ people, she explained how play is a helpful tool in using self-reflection to push past similar fears in our own lives. Making the audience stand and draw circles in the air, Grocott again had the audience participating physically to understand the idea that giving perspective to your beliefs can challenge them. Her take away was that we must always be learning in this world in order to thrive and shift our perspectives in a positive way.
Her take away was that we must always be learning in this world in order to thrive...
Tiffany Gray also challenged the audience about what it means to have choices. Drawing upon the experience of her grandmother whose only choice in life was to become a teacher or wife and mother. Reflecting on all our privileged options to choose jobs, travel locations and education pathways, she explained how our brains are not designed to cope with such a high volume of choice. She continued to explain how many life options simply equal higher levels of anxiety and depression. At a ratio of five to one, our brains seek to self-protect and find personal rewards while at the same time reacting to ever present stimuli – it’s a crazy mix.
We are all a collection of habitual behaviours whose patterns are actionable in our brains at speed of a third of a second. Our bodies need to act on autopilot just to get through the day but some of these behaviours can quickly become redundant. Challenging us to manage ourselves and consider our thoughts not only below the line but intentionally above it, Tiffany gave hope that we can all work to be more conscious of understanding our own brains and making positives changes to ourselves.
At the conclusion of the key note speeches, social impact entrepreneur Sarah Naaden and bio-fitness coach Yanni Kourounis, directed the audience to a series of eight engaging workshops in the space. These included ‘Wonderlab and Meditation’ with Hannah Korsmeyer and Shawn Ashkanasy and a more in-depth exploration of Tiffany Gray’s ‘iMind’ corporate tool which helped me personally map both the energising and draining actions that bounce around my brain day to day.
Opportunities to connect with fellow attendee over a Friday night beverage was a welcome end to the well organised and highly beneficial symposium. Keep your eye out for more like this in the near future.
Originally published on Linked In on November 25, 2017.