POV: UK MUSIC VIDEO AWARDS 

22 November 2021

By Martha Nabila

The evening was everything I hoped it to be- fun, extravagant, informative and inspiring.

The MVA’s take place annually, and celebrate the best music videos of the year- with awards in the production sphere (i.e best wardrobe styling, best animation, best choreography) for individuals (best director, best agency, best production company) and awards for the best video altogether in categories such as rock and rnb.

The recipient of the outstanding achievement award went to Juliette Larthe, and companies such as Pulse, Blink and Island Records were all celebrating achievements that night.

Sitting at lovely table 26, where we were provided hot food, a piling ice bucket of free booze and a great view of the stage, it was incredible to watch so many previews of the highlights of this industry.

Raucous applause after each nomination announcement solidified how collaborative the entire process is a theme I will now go on to explore more, as it was the key thing I took away from the evening.

Being a rookie/newcomer/nobody in every sense, I didn’t come to the MVA’s expecting much more than a gorgeous change of scenery and a lovely evening with people on the course I’d grown so close to over six weeks.

I anticipated at least some sense of gatekeeping- groups of extremely talented people turning their backs to you and keeping their cards and contacts as close to their chests as the treasured awards they received.

But this couldn’t have been further from the truth.

Not only did Create Jobs get a shout-out from the presenter of the ceremony very early on, with a direct instruction to go talk to the ‘future filmmakers’, but every person I encountered, whether it was someone behind me at the much coveted bar or people directly approaching our table purely because we seemed to be having such a good time (we were!), kept no secrets and seemed as enthusiastic about our futures in the industry as we were.

I managed to connect with many people on social media, received great advice about who I should contact and what my next steps would be, and generally felt extremely welcomed and involved.

I can only assume this is down to the ethos of this sphere- the trope of a lone wolf navigating their way to the top is clearly a myth as the moment I met anyone I’d then be meeting their entire team, and everyone had such visible respect and admiration for each other.

As someone with big ideas, lots of ambition but plenty of weak spots, it was such a relief to realise that I didn’t need all the answers and never will- the open spirit and enthusiasm I took into the evening is clearly just as coveted as knowledge, and I came away with a readiness to learn more as opposed to fears over what I don’t currently know.

This was accompanied by a reminder that it’s okay if I don’t understand certain aspects as somebody else will, and that is precisely the point and beauty of creative content production- supporting each other in order to elevate each other.