As this year’s Venice Film Festival is set to commence, a controversy is hanging over it due to the lack of female filmmakers.

In particular, the artistic director Alberto Barbera was under fire for what critics say women directors in this year’s lineup.

The roots of the controversy were traced back to the unveiling of just a single female-directed film, making its way to the film festival’s 20-title competition.

In response, Women in Film Television and Media Italia wrote a scathing open letter in an Italian daily, La Repubblica.

“Seven male directors represent Italian cinema in competition and out of competition at the Venice Film Festival, on the festival’s main stage. It is a one-dimensional selection: entirely male,” the note pointed out.

Opening the canvas of the criticism, the letter read, “Quality is not a divine, neutral, objective category suspended above history.”

“We know full well that it is a concept that moves and evolves, and that art is a battlefield made of bodies, tears, blood and power. It is not a pure heavenly sphere where the angels of quality flutter asexually.”

“Precisely for this reason, the criteria by which we judge quality must themselves be continually questioned,” the statement continued.

“When, year after year, the outcome is such a heavily unbalanced representation, we cannot simply conclude that women directors ‘are not good enough.’ We must ask whether the tools through which we view cinema are still fit for the present day.”

Critics also pointed to a dramatic drop. Last year, only six female-directed films were accepted; now this year’s number has shrunk to just one.

However, Barbera rejected claims of gender bias.

“We were hoping to find more female-directed films for competition, but fewer were submitted,” he told Variety, adding the “women-directed fiction films accounted for 24% of submissions this year, compared with 30% last year.”

Venice Film Festival will run Sept. 2 to 12.