In L.A., 21-year-old Amarise Defranco has just completed her first short film, Lakay. The challenges Defranco has faced in her journey to this point are reflected in the experiences of another young animator, Rebecca Huang.
These two women’s experiences in an industry biased against them are a testament to their own resilience and the changing culture surrounding women in animation.
For Defranco, a visual development artist, Lakay (the Creole word for home) is an incredibly personal story. It delves into mother-daughter relationships and her Haitian culture. It was ‘ambitious to make but meant so much to me and my family’.
The film follows a mother and daughter travelling to Haiti, with fantasy elements incorporated through the daughter’s dreams.
“[Lakay is] a massive passion project for me, considering I scrapped my past project because it meant a whole lot of nothing to me.
“But Lakay gave me the chance to connect with my culture more than I had before.”
The road here wasn’t easy. Defranco’s family required convincing that animation was a viable path. She eventually brought them around, something not every animator is afforded.
“It just made sense for me to go into animation. I’ve loved it since a young age watching all these animated stories on TV with my parents. It felt right.
“[My family] needed to see success. They had a lot of misconceptions that being an artist meant I was going to be starving and broke when that’s not true at all!”
Huang can relate to this experience. Something that shocked her when she first got into the industry was the non-profit Women in Animation’s research, which showed that 70% of art students in colleges and universities are women, despite only 34% of people in industries like animation being women.
“After learning that, I couldn’t help but notice it more and more at the industry panels I went to, where the directors and decision-makers on projects were always men, and the producers and execs were women.
“Which is still great as producers hold up so much of these projects but made me question why there aren’t a lot of women in creative control of these projects?”
Endeavouring to help change this, Huang’s new short, The Human Fossil, was partially funded through a scholarship she received from Women in Animation as wellas her own money being put into it.
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She has worked with many female animators during production. She continuously considers how she can inspire her fellow animators to pursue higher positions in filmmaking.
“I don’t want to sound whiny, but it is something I question as animators rarely stand up for themselves from being exploited. I wonder if the industry is prohibiting female animators from taking leadership roles in projects?
“Maybe they don’t see themselves enough in higher positions, so I wanted to make that change.”
The history of exploitation of lower-level animators is well documented. This was brought into the spotlight last year when Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse was criticized for the harsh production process its team endured.
Defranco candidly explained these brutal conditions further: “So much passion and talent goes into a project like that, but those artists worked were worked to the bone; I’d be willing to bet it’s the hardest any of them worked on a project.
“[Being forced to] kill yourself over a project is so sad and really normalised in the community. [It’s] very dystopian to sacrifice your health in the vein of artistic endeavours. The prospect of being exploited for our work and our labour is very, very real.”
As a recent graduate of The California Institute of the Arts, which was funded by Walt Disney himself, the prospect of working under these conditions is very real for Defranco, who needs to establish herself in the industry.
“As an artist with a voice, you wish to tell stories rather than be a cog in the machine, making little bits and pieces for someone else’s story,
“It can be really soul-sucking not being able to creatively influence that process.”
Huang broadening out to the industry as a whole, is saddened by how women are trapped in boxes for stories they can tell.
“Female directors have to make movies as women about women’s issues to get noticed, which I respect as a way to shed a light on women’s issues, but I hope we can start going into a world where women can tell everyone’s stories not just women’s stories.
“Especially as a woman of colour, I don’t want to be confined to only my experience and stories I want to explore more creative stories beyond race and gender and just have fun.”
Both Defranco and Huang expressed their disappointment with audiences’ perceptions of animation being dismissed as ‘childish’.
Defranco further emphasised how she ‘feels bad’ for people who think like this,
“Animators are fed up with this notion. Animation is not a genre. It’s a medium of storytelling, and some of the best stories I have seen have been through this medium. Animation is not just for teaching children morals. It’s for everybody.”
There is reason to be hopeful though. Huang described how those within the industry can be incredibly supportive of each other. A particular instance that stood out was feedback on The Human Fossil she received from Kristen Lester, director of Pixar’s 2018 short Purl.
“That’s what I love about this industry is that girls support girls and help you share your stories. We need more vocal women like that to encourage and instill faith in us as artists!”
Rebecca’s The Human Fossil Premiered at SVA Theatre in New York on May 8 and the trailer is available below
