She Drew That: A New Monthly Networking Event for Women
Skwigly
If you haven’t heard about it through word of mouth already, there is a brilliant new networking event for women that has hit London; She Drew That.
She Drew That is a workshop set up to connect female freelancers to directors and women in industry. Their first workshop was held in May this year and has taken place every month since. Although previously there was no fixed location, since July, Nexus has kindly welcomed the new event into their studio; resulting in a regular home for future workshops.
The audience at the She Drew That workshop with Katy Wang
What happens at the events?
The workshops centre around a talk given by a female director. After they talk about their career and experience of the industry, they set an animation challenge. The animation challenge centres around a style frame designed by the director. It is a starting point for the animators – a way to practice different styles – and it doesn’t need to be super polished, or fully coloured, and they can be as rough as people like. The main focus of the challenge is to develop women’s animation skills and this is aided by providing a weekly feedback session every Wednesday over Slack.
Katy Wang’s presentation at the She Drew That workshop
Additionally, they also hold a mid-month drink (once a month) in between the workshops; the aim of which to host a more casual event for everyone to hang out and get to know one another better.
You can find out how to follow She Drew That at the bottom of this article.
Founder, Hannah Lau-Walker, said:
I’ve been freelancing for the past eight years and I’ve found on a lot of jobs I’m one of two female animators and sometimes the only women on the team. I’d really like to see that change. I think by building a community and leaning on each other for support and skill development we can make that change. That’s why I set up She Drew That, and it’s been incredible so far. I’ve met more women from the industry in the past four months than I have throughout my entire career. It’s overwhelming how many talented women are out there, and how excited they are to find a community. I didn’t expect She Drew That to be as successful as it has been, but every month so far, we’ve been sold out. I hope that we can continue at this pace and reach out to more women who want to share their experiences and their talents with us.
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- Some of the animation challenge style frames so far
Animation director, Jocie Juritz, who presented at the June workshop (see video below), said this after the event:
Taking part in She Drew That has been a completely refreshing experience. Sharing my work with other female animators has been energising and listening to the talks of wonderful female directors is utterly inspiring. We tend to leave each event with a burst of energy, enthused about our next projects. Monthly animation challenges are set, resulting in beautiful, varied and sometimes hilarious outcomes. Perhaps most importantly of all, it has created an unexpectedly strong sense of community between the women who attend. Freelancing can be a lonely and draining game, but She Drew That is a hub where we go to reboot our inspiration and excitement.
https://vimeo.com/345486619
Regular attendee and animator, Harriet Gillian, added:
What makes ‘She Drew That’ so great is Hannah’s drive to give everyone – directors, animators and graduates – a little nudge up. It’s less ‘look at me’ and much more ‘look at us’, and the best part is, it’s already working.
If you’re interested in getting involved, you can join the network on Slack by emailing Hannah on shedrewthat.animation@gmail.com
She Drew That also post about workshops and jobs in London on their private Facebook group and in their newsletter, which you can sign up to here: http://eepurl.com/goYUNT
To check out the work that’s been produced so far you can follow on Instagram @shedrewthat, and to view their videos which include previous presentations and talks, check out the She Drew That Vimeo page.