#InspireUs: 10 Empowering Quotes From Ava DuVernay
The award-winning filmmaker always drops wisdom on us.
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Shattering the Glass Ceiling - From her Oscar-nominated film, Selma, to her sold out Barbie to the New York Times’ s “DuVernay Test,” filmmaker Ava DuVernay continues to slay us every day with her most powerful weapon — her words. Here are some of her best quotes. By Kellee Terrell(Photo: Michael Kovac/Getty Images)
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Being Brave and Innovative With Your Career - “No one has all her eggs in one basket. Diversify, but stay true to your interests. If you really look at the people you admire, they don't all do one thing.” (BlogHer2015) (Photo: Andrew Toth/Getty Images for Rush Philanthropic Arts Foundation)
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Hollywood’s Racism Isn’t Our Shame - “Marginalized artists have advocated for Academy change for DECADES. Actual campaigns. Calls voiced FROM THE STAGE. Deaf ears. Closed minds. Whether it’s shame, true feelings, or being dragged kicking + screaming, just get it done. Because the alternative isn’t pretty.” (Entertainment Weekly)(Photo: Rick Diamond/Getty Images for Paramount Pictures)
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How We Control Our Own Fate - “[Do] not wait for permission. The key is: What do you want? If you want to be famous and have a big car and a fancy house, that's a different thing. You have to ask permission for that. But if you want to make a film, say, and your reasons are truly for the experience of doing it and for the storytelling and the art of it, you don't have to ask anyone.” (Real Simple) (Photo: Charley Gallay/Getty Images for Women In Film)
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On Opportunity and Seizing It - "All the traditional models for doing things are collapsing; from music to publishing to film, and it’s a wide open door for people who are creative to do what they need to do without having institutions block their art.” (BET)(Photo: Astrid Stawiarz/Getty Images for the 2015 Tribeca film Festival)
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On the Importance of Being Authentic - “It can’t be contrived. So even the conversation about authenticity, in an of itself, is disingenuous. People are trying to manufacture authenticity, and it comes from a very specific place. With that said, I feel comfortable because of my marketing background, I know if it’s authentic, it will sell, it will connect and as long as I’m being authentic in my voice I’m gonna be okay.” (Ad Age)(Photo: Dimitrios Kambouris/Getty Images)
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On Her Responsibility as a Filmmaker - “As a Black woman filmmaker I feel that’s my job: visibility. And my preference within that job is Black subjectivity. Meaning I’m interested in the lives of Black folk as the subject. Not the predicate, not the tangent.[These stories] deserve to be told. Not as sociology, not as spectacle, not as a singular event that happens every so often, but regularly and purposefully as truth and as art on an ongoing basis, as do the stories of all the women you love.” (Essence) (Photo: Frederick M. Brown/Getty Images)
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On Balancing Work, Life and Fun - “From the outside, it may seem as if I'm always working. But that's not how I look at my life. There's no 'I'm here at work' and then 'I'm off work.' It's more like 'This is what I do, and I love it all.' This is my life, whether I'm with friends and family or I'm on set or it's date night or I'm editing. I know a woman who left the entertainment industry to open a bakery. She's now in a commercial kitchen baking all day, and it doesn't feel like work to her, because she loves it. That's how it is for me.” (Real Simple) (Photo: Robin Marchant/Getty Images for SiriusXM)
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On Sexism in the Workplace - "It defies culture in so many ways. It affects the way we see ourselves and the way we are seen by others. It gets into the DNA of how we treat each other, the policies we make, what we're able to say and do to each other. For there only to be one dominant voice determining what's said and saying it is something that all like-minded people who believe in dignity of everyone should be concerned about. That comes into play for women and for people of color." (Hollywood Reporter) (Photo: Christopher Polk/Getty Images)
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Why Creating Our Own Stories Matter - “There’s something very important about films about Black women and girls being made by Black women. It’s a different perspective. It is a reflection as opposed to an interpretation, and I think we get a lot of interpretations about the lives of women that are not coming from women.” (Huffington Post) (Photo: Pascal Le Segretain/Getty Images)