Ogilvy NZ and Lumo Put Women’s Work Where it Belongs This International Women’s Day

The campaign is running in high impact Lumo outdoor sites throughout Auckland and Wellington, alongside a ‘Women’s Work’ exhibition which is showing at the Ellen Melville Centre until the 12th of March.  Women’s Work is a collective of female and non-binary professional photographers who are working hard to increase representation across the industry, and to level the playing field for commercial opportunities.

The ads in the campaign will showcase the talent of the ‘Women's Work’ collective in categories still dominated by male photographers, and ask the advertising industry to have a good hard think about the inequity in the statistics. 

Kristal Knight, executive creative director at Ogilvy NZ explains: “Women influence over 85% of consumer goods purchases. Across many categories, women are the primary targets and the biggest spenders. But the proportion of advertising imagery shot by women is still less than 20%. With this year's International Women's Day theme being 'Embrace Equity', it’s a fitting moment to pose the question to the advertising industry – why?

“It’s incredible to think how much money the industry aims to make from selling to women, without giving them an equal opportunity to earn it by shooting the ads. I know from my own experience of being art director for 20 odd years that this probably comes from unconscious bias – of typecasting the work of photographers, making selections based on what the photographer has done in the past, not by what they are capable of doing. So some categories have become more male dominated, like car photography for example, and it’s become harder and harder for women to get a foot in the door to these jobs. We wanted to challenge the industry to take a moment and think about the role we play in these stats.”

Victoria Baldwin, founder of Women’s Work says: “Equality means each individual or group of people is given the same resources or opportunities. But equity recognizes that each person has different circumstances and allocates the exact resources and opportunities needed to reach an equal outcome. Which is why it’s so important we use International Women’s Day as a platform to help get female photographers the exposure they need for a level playing field. The support of Ogilvy and Lumo will help us make some much-needed noise.”