Women outnumber men for the first time in Barcelona awards and prizes

Coinciding with the week of 8M, International Women Day, the Institut de Cultura de Barcelona (ICUB) has published the latest report of the Observatory of Cultural Data “Culture and Gender”, with figures for the year 2023. The Observatory reaffirms, once again, that women are the main gender in participation in the city’s cultural activities, although their role in management or commissioning tasks still needs to be encouraged and given more attention.

However, of the three major literary festivals organised by the ICUB, only Barcelona Poesia had a higher participation of women than men: 51% were women. In the case of Festival 42 (devoted to fantasy genres), the percentage of women was 45%, and at BCNegra, 37%, in line with previous years.

What is new is that, for the first time, the percentage of Barcelona prizes and awards given to women exceeded that of men. And this in a year in which the number of women on the juries that decide prizes and awards has dropped to 50%. A clear example of this is the Ciutat de Barcelona Awards in the field of literature, as all four awards went to women: the Ciutat de Barcelona Award for Literature in Catalan language to the work Lo mig del món, by Roser Vernet, published by Club Editor; the Ciutat de Barcelona Award for Literature in Spanish language went to Las niñas del naranjel (Random House), by Gabriela Cabezón Cámara; the Catalan-language Translation Award went to Marta Pera for her translation from English into Catalan of Orlando (Viena Edicions) by Virginia Woolf; and the Agustí Duran i Sanpere Ciutat de Barcelona Award for Essay, Humanities and History of Barcelona went to Mar García Puig for La historia de los vertebrados (Random House) / La història dels vertebrats (La Magrana).

14 grants Montserrat Roig and 3 grants Carme Montoriol

In the case of the 2023 literary grants, the majority of women were also evident. In the case of the Montserrat Roig, writing grants, 14 women 6 men received them. The 14 women awarded grants were Júlia Bacardit Cruells, Roser Bastida Barau, Lolita Bosch, Leonor Courtoisie Malaneschii, Brigitte González Vasallo, Laura Gonzalvo Horna, Helena Guilera i Recoder, Sonia Hernández Hernández, Anna Miracle Fandos, Marta Rebón Rodríguez, Marta Soldado Fernández, Patrícia Soley-Beltran, Elaine Vilar Madruga and Clara V. Fleck.

As for the Carme Montoriol playwriting grants, in 2023 they went to 4 women and 1 men. The 3 women with grants were Alba Collado, Helena Tornero and Carla Rovira.

The Vil·la Joana literary residencies also had more women than men, more than twice as many: 15 women to 7 men. Aleksandra Orlic (Croatia), Irina Markova (Ukraine), Marta Jordan (Poland), Ellen Savage (Austria), Lucy Hounsom (Exeter), Sára Zeithammerová (Czech Republic), Suzanne Ibrahim (Syria), Caroline Brothers (Austria), Julia Wong (Peru), Simona Hamer (Slovakia), Sharlene Teo (Singapore), Sabina Orozco (Mexico), Yvvette Edwards (United Kingdom), Carolina Cobelo (Buenos Aires) and Violaine Bérot (France) were the female writers and translators who enjoyed a literary stay at Vil·la Joana.

Consult the Observatory of Cultural Data “Culture and Gender” at this link.