We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Hera Güneş Barlowe. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Hera Güneş below.

Hera Güneş , appreciate you joining us today. The first dollar you earn is always exciting – it’s like the start of a new chapter and so we’d love to hear about the first time you sold or generated revenue from your creative work?

I couldn’t sleep at night when I got the email telling me I got my first professional acting job. I kept repeating, “OMG, I’m gonna be working in Darren Aronofsky’s new film with Austin Butler and Zoe Kravitz as my first background gig!”. It meant the world to me. I’ve always admired Aronofsky’s film. And I never thought I’d be able to experience being on his set as my first acting gig. What an honor and such a great memory for the beginning of my career.

After so many years of studying and only so recently after graduating from the American Academy of Dramatic Arts in NYC, which was again a huge dream of mine for a long time. I was so glad I backed out of the web series gig, my first in-person audition; everything about it was off. I’m so grateful I had the self-compassion and confidence to say no to a job that made me uncomfortable, even though the pay could’ve helped me out a lot.

Life always has greater plans waiting for you when you dare to listen to your heart and gut. I’m much happier that my first acting job after graduating was in Aronofsky’s film. It was such a change of pace and professionalism after that horrible audition. I learned so many helpful insights from the incredible extras and PAs on set. Especially at the beginning of my career, I now know what the highest quality of work, ethics, and professionalism should be like as a guide for myself. I also acquired so much respect for the crew and the extras. We shot for 13 hours till dawn, and most of that time was just standing outside on New York streets in costumes, waiting for the light and camera changes to be complete. It gave me even more respect for the crew, who worked non-stop with such determination. I never comprehended that when I was a kid, on set with my parents, who are film directors in Istanbul, Turkiye. Even at the biggest productions of the country that I’ve been to, as Turkish people being Mediterranean, it was always nonchalant. I’m so incredibly grateful that I get to work here with artists who care so deeply about their work. I plan to bring the professionalism I learned on my first professional gig to every project for the rest of my career.

Hera Güneş , love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

Hi I’m Hera Güneş Barlowe. I’m an actor and artist from Istanbul, Turkiye. I now live in the States for the past 5 years. Litte fun facts about me, Güneş means the sun in Turkish, which I have always loved. I LOVE french fries. I also love watching old movies, especially the ones with Cary Grant.

When I was 3, my mom asked me, “What did you come into this world to do?” And I apparently said, “I came into this world to make people laugh.” I believe, deep down, we already know what we’re here for, but we get conditioned to reject it along the road. Being raised by a family of film directors, I had the opportunity to explore. Growing up next to a sea of grade-obsessed parents, I’ve always been so grateful that mine encouraged me to try new things and discover who I am.

Starting from an early age, at my school and at my mom’s atelier, which was a hub for artists to give a great deal of variety of art classes from marbling to body percussion. I was lucky to try many branches of arts and sports. So I sing, dance, paint, sculpt, kickbox, do horseback riding, fencing, ice skating, and many more. Some of them I gave up on, like basketball or tennis, after 1-2 years of doing them, and some are trades I still carry with me.

I love being diverse, and I’ve always been obsessed with trying everything. I would instead try and regret it than yearn for it years after not even trying. Traveling is also a big passion of mine. For example, my boyfriend and I were in Finland in early February to see the northern lights, which was a magical trip. We had a sauna experience where you plunged into the ice-cold Baltic Sea right out of the sauna, which was one of the most incredible and memorable experiences of my life. I feel truly alive when I’m traveling. I’m always so excited to learn about new cultures and meet new people around the globe. It nourishes my work as an artist and keeps me fresh.

We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.

Injuries. I’ve had my share of stupid injuries. But I never once quit on a performance.

Once, I had a dance performance where I was going to do a cartwheel, and the day before, I fell into a pool and sprained my ankle. But the next day, I still did that show. Yes, I didn’t do the cartwheel, but I did the rest of the choreography with my wrapped ankle. Then, at AADA, when I was recovering from a knee dislocation and a toe injury, one a sports injury and the other a stupid, unnecessary movement I did in dance rehearsal, I took the rest when I needed to recover and still showed up to my rehearsals and performances, which I don’t know if I’m proud of or not anymore. I feel like this is not perceived as something to be proud of in our grind culture, but I wish I had fully taken time off to recover. Cause, at the end of the day, health must come first. When you’re having health issues, everything else loses its importance; nothing else really matters. Even though I was resting, I was still pushing myself by continuing my classes and performances, and well, postponing my full recovery by doing so.

I honestly have a lot of trauma from my injuries. I didn’t feel like myself. Couldn’t trust my body. Felt so trapped and helpless. Feeling so scared to cause any more injury. With the simplest day-to-day movements that I usually wouldn’t even think twice about, I had to be strategic so I wouldn’t feel more pain than I already felt. So many nights of crying myself to sleep after a long day of classes and performances. The unknown abyss of not knowing when all this pain would be over, and I could walk again freely.

Now, I’m so much better, even though it did take me longer than it should. I’m working out and stretching every day to avoid any injuries. I’m learning to navigate my young adult body and making peace with it not being how it was when I was a teenager.

Is there a particular goal or mission driving your creative journey?

I strive to amplify the voices of those whose stories remain untold and refuse to be heard.

From age 6, I have felt a strong intuition to advocate against injustices affecting people, animals, and the environment. Even at my kindergarten, when everyone was picking candy or games as topics for their projects, I was focusing on spreading awareness about endangered animals. I always had a powerful connection to animals and nature and the daily injustice they face. I channel my acting as a way to be a voice for them. It breaks me to my very core to see them abused and their abuse being normalized. We’re not superior to animals or nature. Just as no one has the right to take a human’s life, we don’t have the right to take theirs just because they cannot stand up for themselves.

I will never understand people who refuse to stay up-to-date on politics. Politics affects all of us; every single detail of our lives is affected by it. I was at my first rally when I was 12. And as an actor, I carry that side of me when I’m portraying the lives of people who are unfairly ruined by the choices of others. People who are not in power, people who are dying because their greedy leaders are at war with each other. Women who are unsafe in their own homes, streets, and country.

Growing up in Turkiye as a girl got worse in time. When I reached my teenage years, I always had to think one step ahead, be aware of my surroundings, and carry changes of clothes for different neighborhoods. Even in the safest neighborhoods, starting from too young of an age, I had to deal with creeps, was constantly stared at, and even once, my friends and I were followed; thankfully, we knew the closest police station, so we walked there. But guess what? Half an hour later, those guys were out on the streets, and we saw them across the avenue, very angrily pacing. Probably looking for us. Knowing that this is the minimum level of assault women and girls go through every day somewhere around the world, knowing you can’t even trust the police to protect us, infuriates me to my very core. Today, in my country, femicides are day-to-day news; some don’t even make it to the news; only the most horrifying ones do, while the police do nothing because, to them, women deserve to be “put into their place” by their husbands. And the UN studies say worldwide, the most dangerous place for a woman is their own home.

This is what my work means to me: being a channel, a mirror, an amplifier. I will always continue to consciously stand up to tell stories about nature and animals and of women who are abused into being voiceless, stolen of a childhood and freedom…

Contact Info:

• Website: https://herabarlowe.wixsite.com/home
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/gunesp/
• Other: IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/name/nm15765577/

Image Credits

Bianca Victoria
Luana Seu