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Welcome. I am Elizabeth Sackler and I'd like to welcome you to the Elizabeth A. Sackler
Center for Feminist Art. We opened in 2007 in March so we are coming up on our second
anniversary which is a very exciting thing. Thank you. Yes. Thank you to all of you and
thank you to this wonderful museum and to my staff at the foundation. It is wonderful
to see you all here today. When I was envisioning the Center for Feminist Art part of what I
wanted to have here in addition to hosting The Dinner Party and having it available all
the time and in addition to our Herstory Gallery and in addition to the feminist gallery is
this space. This space brings to people all kinds of discussions, artists, politics, writers,
you name it, that otherwise we wouldn't be able to do. We have called it The Forum because
it is a forum for ideas, for discussions and also for a chance to celebrate the kind of
works and things that we are going to be seeing today. I'm delighted that you are here. Obviously
our focus is on feminist activism and feminist art. Today we have two artists in the audience
with us. Cristina Biaggi is with us and also Linda Stein. I'd like to welcome you and thank
you for coming. If I've missed somebody please tell me, Joan Semmel. Nancy Azara. Nancy,
I'm sorry. Thank you, I didn't see you. Linda Hudler. Hello Linda. How are you? Fine, thanks.
Good. This is great. Today, Yes They Did! We just couldn't pass that one by, we stole
it obviously, it's derivative. It is a celebration of women who dared and the collection of photographs
by Daile Kaplan and Donna Henes is comprised of thousands of photographs as they liked
to describe them, of remarkable women who did exceptional things. Of course I like to
think that all women are remarkable and that all women do exceptional things. In this instance
of course we have some documentation of that. It was really fun putting these remarks together
because Daile and Donna have listed, and from their list of the actions and the activities
of the women, I was just sort of clumping them together. It comes out as a wonderful
clump when I started to itemize them out: actresses, adventurers and artists; bullfighters
and ball players; circus performers and models doesn't that sort of make sense? nurses and
nuns; politicians and students; and suffragists and spies. We have also women who in their
daily activities are caring for children, breastfeeding, cooking, cleaning and gardening.
I say happily are included and accorded equal status with political or cultural achievements
and well they should be. They include familiar names Bella Abzug, Shirley Chisholm, Elinor
Chisholm, Eleanor Roosevelt, Jane Adams, Susan B. Anthony, Amelia Earhart, Calamity Jane,
one of my favorite people in history. Margot Fonteyn, another favorite. Mary Todd Lincoln,
Grandma Moses, Gertrude Stein, Sojourner Truth, Victoria Woodhull, who was in our exhibition
of first women's votes. I don't know if you had a chance to see that one. It was at the
Herstory Gallery. Some names that I was not familiar with: Conchita Citron Conchita Citron.
who was a bullfighter. Love it. Didn't know there was a woman bullfighter. Pauline Cushman,
who was a Civil War Union spy. *** Gorman, strong woman. I guess she was lifting weights,
yes? Jeanne La Mar, who was a champion phantom weight boxer. Obviously their collections
features amateur, press and canted images as well as fine art photographs by recognized
masters. All of the photographs are original and vintage prints. I want to apologize to
people who are standing in the back, we have a full house, and I hope there is a place
to lean and to rest yourself when you need it. We'll see if we can provide additional
chairs. I would like to introduce Daile Kaplan, who is Vice President and Director of Photographs
at Swann Auction Galleries. If you haven't been there, I'm sure it's a treat that you
would enjoy seeing. It's New York's oldest specialty auction house. She
has been a photograph specialist on the Antiques Roadshow since 1998, has appeared as a commentator
for TV segments produced by the Herstory. Herstory Channel, see? I am already Good.
Just changing. Been programmed. The History Channel, Discovery Channel, Bravo TV, and
curated photography exhibitions for museums in the United States and abroad. Ms. Kaplan
has contributed essays to publications devoted to photography, including The Education of
a Photographer with Allworth Press in 2007 and the forthcoming In the Vernacular, which
is Boston University Press, and 2008, it says. So I guess it's out? It is out. She has lectured
extensively about vernacular imagery and visual culture and I thank her for being here. Donna
Henes is the author of The Queen of My Self: Stepping into Sovereignty in Midlife, which
was published by Monarch Press in 2005. She is an urban shaman, a shawoman and contemporary
ceremonialist. So if you need something after this wonderful lecture, give her a holler.
She was commemorated in the New Yorker and named New York City's Unofficial Commissioner
of Public Spirit.
And the Village Voice calls her part performance artist, part Witch which I think is a compliment
and part social organizer for Planet Earth. So this is a very great piece of energy and
all of you who are here who are embodying the same energy, I thank you for coming. Her
public work has received citations from the Mayors Dinkins and Koch, and grants from NEA
and the New York Foundation for the Arts. She's a multi-published author. She also writes
a weekly column for UPI's Religion and Spirituality Forum. An artist included in WACK! Art and
the Feminist Revolution, which many of you may have seen and was featured in Feminists
Who Changed America 63 to - 60? 70? what is it? I lopped it off 73, by Barbara Love in
2007. And she received an award from the Veteran Feminists of America. So please join me in
a hearty welcome for our wonderful panelists today. Thank you. Welcome. It is really great
to see you all here, and thank you so much for coming. And yes, I hope your feet don't
hurt at the end of this presentation. Before we start, I would like on behalf of both of
us to thank Dr. Sackler, Elizabeth, who has been great. And I really appreciate your interest
in this collection and your support of it. Thank you very much. Our collection is called
The Better Half, and Daile is going to give a little bit of an overview about the collection.
Well, The Better Half is composed of about 2000 photographs. You're going to see a small
percentage of them today. And what we decided to do about 15 years ago when we looked at
the history of photography, looked at our personal backgrounds, and thought, We want
a joint project. We want to do something that addresses women our photography, history.
And we began to focus on pictures of women doing things. The photographs in our collection,
as Elizabeth said, are vintage photographs. They're original, first-generation photographs
that span the entire history of photography. Now with regard to the images, the reason
I make that point is most of the images in our collection are anonymous. Most of the
subjects in our collection are unknown. So, the techniques associated with the history
of photography, in addition to bringing these pictures to life, because we really love our
collection, let me tell you, we really, really love it, they allow us to date the pictures.
It allows us to create a narrative that's both chronological, anecdotal, and, of course,
historical, when it comes to women of accomplishment, some to the names Elisabeth mentioned earlier.
So, what we thought we would do is talk a little bit about our personal interest, or
our backgrounds. And, shall I move to the first slide? No. No, OK. This is how we work.
You're getting a preview of our collaborations. The first question that everybody asks us
when the collection comes up in conversation is, How did you get started? Why did you do
this? What gave you the idea to do this? And, as Daile mentioned, our lives are so different.
We're involved in such completely different arenas of life. We thought, Wouldn't it be
great to work on a collaborative project? And, I come out of working on several collaborative
projects with women, and I really love that. I was part of the very first consciousness
raising group in New York. And, from there, I was on the editorial board of one of the
issues of Heresies Magazine, if any of you remember Heresies Magazine, a journal of feminism
and art or something like that. And then, after that, Daile and I both, although the
way we met was that I replaced her not because she wasn't good, because she was leaving town
as a member of Disband, which was a women's performance group. And, I still belong to
a Goddess Group that started with the Heresies issue. And, we still meet once a month 30
years later. So, I love working with groups of women and this seemed a really interesting
possibility. So, what did we have in common? Daile is the photo expert, of course. But,
I do have a love of photography and a private photo ritual practice, as it were. And, we
both feel very connected to the lives of women in Women's Herstory. So, this is how we got
started. And, we thought, Well, we'll collect photographs of women, isn't that interesting?
And then, I thought, Well, not just photographs of any woman. Photographs of every woman for
sure in an archival sense, but 100 years ago.Donna Master's thesis was called Women in Art: Object
or Subject? And, of course, my conclusion was object. Because, if you walk around most
museums, women are depicted either as lounging on a or as standing behind their man or just
another pretty face. And, I was really interested in women as subjects and the stories that
they had to tell. And, that is what's so special about the sacred center where we are right
now. So, this is what got us started, this first slide that you are going to see. Maybe
we could turn the lights down. Yeah. We're doing that. Yeah. You're wish is our command.
Yes. Now, this is a family photograph of mine. And, the story that came with it that my mother
always told me is, this is my grandmother with a bunch of her friends. They were all
married women with children, and they were having a pajama party. But, what's interesting
Well, several things are interesting in this picture. First of all, what interesting, is
even though they were married women with children they still had these two chaperones, who were
not in their night clothes. I guess they were just making sure there was no hanky-panky
in the sleep over. But, what really moved me about this picture, because on first look,
you would say, Well, these are, maybe, objects. These are just women sitting in a row and
their outfits are interesting. The idea of having a pajama party is interesting in the
1910s, but what fascinates me about this picture, and you'll know who she is, is my grandmother.
If you look at the faces of these women, they might be objects, although I hate to say that,
because, of course, we know they are not. But, there is one woman in particular who
is really asserting her personality. She's downright flirting with the photographer.
That come hither look in her eyes, I can't believe it, but that's my grandmother. So
that's what got us started. This was our first picture. And, another reason that we really
love this picture is the notion of a woman in a picture flirting with the photographer.
Who's the photographer? We don't know. It wasn't my grandfather. We don't know exactly
the gender, we don't know how this came about, but the narrative, something started to gel
in relation to building a collection that was going to have a lot of interesting stories
associated with it. So, in terms of today's presentation, we're focusing on adventurous
women, daring women. Well, does it mean to be a daring woman in art culture? In the 19th
century, it could have meant simply being unladylike, wanting to participate in sports,
wanting to be politically active, cross dressing. In terms of 20th century economics and, as
we'll see images of the First World War, it could have an association with economic necessity
and taking on jobs and roles that were, again, stretching the boundaries of what it meant
to be defined as a woman. We actually came up with a little list, and it would be very
curious if you have another idea of what's daring, just shout it out, because I think
that would be fascinating. We have somebody who invents her own life, somebody who defies
expectation, who expresses her own individuality, who may be unladylike. I cannot find this
quote, but I seem to remember that Mother Jones, who was a union organizer, and pistol,
and anarchist said something like, Rockefeller's have ladies, but the good lord God made women.
And who pushed the boundaries. Does anyone else have an idea of what would be a daring
theme? It kind of covers it, but I thought maybe with all creative women somebody might
have another definition. So, our next slide. So, when we look at a picture like this, which
has Weegee-esque associations. But, in fact, it's not a Weegee photograph. We bring to
the picture a kind of reading, What's going on here? We see to the right of the woman,
smoke coming out of the window, we assume that she's leaping for her life. There's what
appear to be a police man in the foreground. But, often times, the real beauty of this
collection and looking at images, is this shared dialogue. Well, what do you see? What
do you think is going on in this picture? Because, again, many of the pictures in our
collection aren't by anonymous photographers. The subjects aren't identified. It's a vernacular
collection that is grounded in the history of art and social history and in feminism.
So, quite a difference, right? Up until the industrial revolution, the lives that most
women lead were pretty circumspect. Certainly, and we all know in the dinner party attest
to it, there have always been daring, amazing women throughout history and throughout culture.
But, these were the exceptions.
Up until that point, the only way that women could really be out in the world, again, for
the most part, was to read about it. And, that is, if somebody taught them how to read.
Because it wasn't considered necessary for most women to be educated or to be literate.
So, the doors for a woman were really in her book. And then, the industrial revolution
opened the window for women. It allowed them to go into the workplace in a different way
and in much greater numbers. And it allowed them to be more mobile and less dependent
on their male counterparts to take them places and chaperone them, as it were. So in looking
at this image and some of the other images from the 19th century, because we bring so
much of our own expectations to looking at older pictures, it's important to understand
that this is how this woman chose to be represented. She went to the local studio photographer,
she brought her book, she set up the tableau. I'm sure with the photographer, him or herself,
because photography from the beginning was an equal- opportunity employer. There were
many women daguerreotypists, many women practicing photography from the 1840's onward. So this
notion of, how do I want to be shown, is very much a staged notion. And, what we see in
this wonderful ambrotype is taking it to the next step. This idea of a really curious,
a really mischievous woman looking out, the seeker, the kind of quintessential seeker
that is this foundation of our collection. So this is an ambrotype, it's a unique image,
it's actually a photograph on glass. They're housed in these little leather miniature books
called cases, leather cases. It's protected with a sheet of glass, a preserver. So you
get a whole package here. And you can begin to understand how precious photographs were,
how really special they were to the 19th century viewer. So the window opened, the door opened,
and there's no going back for us. We're going to Harvard. Or Vassar, actually, which was
the first women's college. So women started getting educated and started going out into
the world, living lives on their own. Is that Elizabeth Taylor? No, couldn't possibly be.
Maybe her doppelganger. Couldn't possibly be. This is an album from Wells College, which
a woman put together. And we have several albums, we love albums. Because album-making,
and even today scrapbooking, is the big thing. There are whole stores and television programs
dedicated to the art of scrapbooking. So here, we love these albums, not just for the individual
pictures, but because of the writing on them. And sometimes they're very creative, and there
are little drawings, and they're just so personal and a real look into these women's lives.
So you've seen these blue-toned images if you like to go antiquing, if you're a big
yard sale aficionado. These are cyanotypes, one of the more popular photographic techniques
in the 1890's, turn of the last century. And what's interesting about it is that it really
was a technique directed to women, especially students, amateurs, because there were no
chemicals involved in making these pictures. They were printed out with the sunlight. And
so, in a lot of the student albums that we see from Wells College and from other universities
this is the predominant technique. And as Donna said, the fact that the pictures are
annotated, they're captioned, really gives us a lot of information about college life.
It looked like it was fun. You can't go back. Forget it. That was quick. You all recognized
that, we all have one just like it. Oh you did go? Oh thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
Yes. So this is very recognizable and we really like pictures like this that are resonant
to all of us. We can look at this and we see our self in it, we see our mother in it, and
also personally, we each have such a different, similar, the same and also different, take
on creating this collection. Personally, I love when it comes to a type. Whether it's
a student, or a nurse, or a teacher, I love to try to find them of every decade. It's
so interesting to see how we have progressed. And so she's very recent. So, once women have
gotten their education and once the roads were built they took off. And this is, yes
we love this picture, both of us love this. It's so lyrical. And it's just like it's a
big world out there and my bag is packed and here I come. Watch out world! It just, again,
these pictures that don't have information associated with them sort of lend themselves
to such poetic interpretations and the composition of this picture, the way she's just gazing
out into the sea, the world. We do, we love this picture. And this is the world. We started
off on foot and don't you love that. I mean, hiking in those long dresses and those boots
with little heels. Slippery leather soles and hats. Perfectly pressed white blouses.
Long sleeves. Long sleeves. Of course. So, here we are. And if there is a ledge you're
going to find a woman on it. So that says. Cliff Dwellers, December 30th 1907. Ooh, you
have good eyes. Yeah. This is the Angel Trail going down to the Grand Canyon. Again, how
do they keep those blouses clean I want to know? Now, there are going to be a few pictures
of her. Her name is Mrs. Maxwell and she had two skills. One, she was an expert marks-woman.
And she was the first woman taxidermist. And we'll talk a little bit more about the taxidermy,
but here she was out hunting with her hound. With her real dog, yes. Of course we don't
know whether that is before or after it died This one we do know. This is a fox. So, this
is a stereo image. It's captioned, it's dated 1876. What we start to see in the 19th century
images is this notion that women support their activities by selling photographs of what
they do. And so, she was someone who exhibited at the Philadelphia Centennial in 1876. What's
interesting about her is that she elected not to exhibit in the women's pavilion (and
that there even was a women's pavilion deserves further research), but that she decided to
exhibit in the Natural History pavilion and created this diorama that apparently almost
sent her in to bankruptcy. But, she was a woman who was a naturalist. She was a woman
who had, as Donna said, these other skill sets and she was a legend in her own time.
And, who would have known if we didn't find this picture. Now, she has a name. Her name
is Mrs. Malen, and I'm going to read this because there's a printed caption that was
affixed to the back of the mount of this. This strange woman has become notorious throughout
Colorado for her *** manner of living. The cabin is situated on top of Gold Hill, opposite
of Buena Vista, at an elevation of 10,000 feet or about 3000 feet higher than the town.
The cabin was built mostly by herself. She's also making all of her furniture alone. Mrs.
Malen has lived in this odd place for two years. She carries water a mile for cooking
and often carries a sack of flour, which, of course, would be a 10 or 50 pound sack,
up the steep hill for three or four miles where others can scarcely follow empty handed.
So, she's kind of shero. But again, what's noteworthy about this is she's selling this
picture, and she's talking about herself in the third person, as this kind of *** local
oddball. I mean, here's the photograph. There she is, posing in front of her cabin. Guess
what? There's no Kodak camera available then. She is soliciting the services of a local
photographer, creating this whole legend around herself and supplementing her income. Pretty
cool. And the exploration continues. This is the 1940s. Again, they're wearing high
heels to explore this cave. Isn't that the only way to do it? I guess. One wants to be
ladylike at all costs. So as I said, if there's a cliff, you're going to find a woman on it
and her loyal dog. Yeah. So, not only did they set off by foot, but by wheel. And this
is pre-bloomer. This is bicycle with long skirts again. This is, I think, our earliest
bicycle picture. And, interestingly enough - I'm always going to be interjecting this
photographic theme - the introduction of the bicycle is parallel with the introduction
of the Kodak camera. So you see this whole recreational element emerging in the late
1880s, 1890s, and it was really revolutionary: women in long skirts on bikes. And then, cars.
Look, we know that there are places in the world today that it's illegal for women to
drive. So this is very early. And then, this is a kind of chronological sequence. So not
only were they out for a joyride, she's on a serious adventure here with her map. This
is a gas station she stopped in. Oh, wait a second. What does that say? Coast Oh, interesting.
It's Coast Tires. That's her extra tire on the side of the And once you have a car, you
got to take care of it. What year is this picture? I'd say this is the 30s, based on
the car, although I'm not a car expert. But I think so. Probably 34. Yeah, 34. OK. 34!
That was precise. Wow. OK. And here we go again. How do you change your tire? You got
to wear a skirt and high heels. This is the 50s, right? Yeah, this is 50s. Yeah, this
is the 50s. And his is an automotive high school. So, she's actually in school learning
to be a mechanic. So we should probably say that finding these pictures is kind of difficult.
There are just not at the top of the matted photograph heap, when you go into a trade
show or when you walk into a gallery. This really has taken a lot of discovery and invention,
because a visual history of women, not that important. And so, we've really done our thorough
homework. I mean, Donna is great about going into every single picture in every stack.
She's very thorough. And then, we go for the speed. So this is an early motorcycle. And
then, we just check to the sky. Oh, yeah! Again, notice her outfit. It just drives me
crazy. I also think if you could if the picture were a lot more readable on the screen, you
would see that she too is flirting with the photographer. She's having a wonderful time
up there. Now, we do know who she is. This is Ruth Law. Yeah, this is Ruth Law. And on
the back of the picture there's a handwritten notation that says, Ruth Law, our first woman
aviatrix, and Yours truly. But we don't know who yours truly is. In Daytona, Florida, July
4th, 1921. So this is an early biplane. And again, she's definitely dressed for the skies.
And we know her; she's everybody's shero. Even though she came along later, she was
definitely the premier aviatrix and captured everybody's imagination. All I know about
this picture is that it's in Portland, Oregon. And she's got her map and she's ready to take
off. In her heels. Now you see her name. Her full name is Valentina Vladimirovna Tereshkova.
She was the very first woman in space - Russian. Soviet, we should say. Was Sally Ride. Yes.
Let see. We have. Oh, let me see. So that's Sally Ride in the lower left. That's Judith
Resnik in the top right, who perished in the Challenger tragedy. And Margaret Rhea Seddon.
Right. She is next Sally Ride, the blonde woman upfront. Yeah. Kathryn Sullivan, Shannon
Lucid, Anna Fisher, and Judith Resnik. So now, we're transitioning to another category:
as women horizons widen, broaden, so do their ambitions. These are a bunch of firsts. This
is Tennessee Claflin. Her nickname was Tennie. She was Victoria Woodhull's sister, and the
two of them were the first stockbrokers first woman stockbrokers. They had a brokerage house
and then they went on to publish the Woodhull and Claflin Weekly, which featured articles
written only by women and about women's rights, education of women and free love. Her name is Louisa Parker, and she's one the
very first women doctors. She graduated from the New England Female Medical College in
1861. She practiced in Boston for 38 years, and in her spare time had 10 children. Oh!
Oh, my god! This is a physician. We found the photo. We don't know her name or where
she practiced. It's just one of those fantastic images that, again, is posed. It's done intentionally.
But to find a photograph of a woman doctor is pretty special. Yeah. These are the first
woman gendarmes in Paris, in 1935. There they are, pictured in there fabulous outfits. It
looks like the heels gave away to clunky shoes. They did a lot of walking. Our collection
also includes photographs from around the world. We want to see how there is this interrelationship
between the quest for equal rights in England, in France and the United States. And how it
all kind of mixes and interrelates. So oh, yes and this is an early fire fighter. And
this is a drill; a practice drill. It was a rescue. So, it's kind of amazing. And then
the next series that you are going to see are all factory pictures. And this is what
Daile was mentioning before that oh, I'm sorry, I forgot about her. Yes, and actually we just,
just, just obtained a photograph of Florence Nightingale, which would be in the slide show
before her. But it came so late we did not even have time to scan it. But this is a field
nurse in the field as you can see during World War II. Now the factory. Now you know we are
all familiar and love the idea of Rosie the Riveter. And that was World War II. I don't
think I ever realized that there were women actively working in factories to support World
War I. And here they are. And they're just a whole series of pictures. And this is what
Daile was mentioning before about what is daring. Sometimes it's daring to leave your
home and your children, and your whatever. And go out and work in a filthy, dangerous,
noisy place because you had to. Either for your own personal economic situation, or because
of a greater political situation, which called people into service. So this is a scene from
a munitions factory in Britain, and again the Rosie the Riveter archetype, in some ways
can be traced to how women's roles were in transition during the First World War, and
how that sort of trickles down to the United States during the Second World War. So this
is all heavy, loud machinery. Women working in skirts, of course they are not allowed
to wear anything more comfortable. This is the Curtiss Aviation factory. Glenn Curtiss
was one of the pioneers of the American airplane industry. He had women workers in his employ.
I just wanted to say that all of these are fascinating, but we don't really know who
these women are; we don't have their personal stories. OK. This is called 20 Ton Crane OET,
whatever that means. We're not quite sure what these are. That looks cleaner and quieter
than the other ones. I think it is parachutes again related to British military presence
in the First World War. Exactly. Thank you Sherman. Actually since we've been collecting
these, I've read that the herstory of women working in factories to support war actually
went all the way back to the Civil War, and I would give anything to find photographs
of this. But women hand made, in little molds the lead bullets, which probably killed them
actually. So for all you Art History students, this picture has the association with Renchenko
with Lewis Hine as kind of turning the industrial wheel. And here's a woman behind it. This
is the creed. Is a sailboat making they're making? Some sort of a boat part I think.
Looks like an airplane wing. Yeah, maybe. These are the airplane wings. This is more
Curtiss Motor Corp. And we're still building them. This is World War II. Yes. And then,
after a hard day at the factory, girls just want to have a little fun! It was fun to look
up women's baseball to do a Google search. Because the first 20 pages were all about
women as spectators at baseball games. But, if you dig a little deeper, you discover that
Vassar; Vassar keeps coming up. Vassar had the first women's baseball team. There were
teams in the 1870's called the Blondes and the Brunettes. There were games in which teams,
female teams played against male teams. And this picture is probably, there it is, stated
1891. So it's 30, 40 years into the game, but again very rare to find an image like
this and they're all identified, which is even better. Now I just noticed, this is called
the Young Ladies Baseball Club, because the next one. Now we've got the Bloomer Girls,
not so ladylike. They were not only daring because they played the sport, but that they
put on pants. Now, does anybody know what game this is exactly? It's a shot-put. It's
a shot-put. Shot-put. Oh my gosh. So they're a team. Wow, I didn't realize the shot-put had
a string attached to it. This is 1927 high school portrait. And the teacher. They figured
out their outfits pretty well. The striped socks. This is Jean La Mar, the world bantamweight
champion. And she was popular in the 1920's. This picture is dated 1925. Looks like she's
socking her manager, I guess he didn't do a good job. And here she is. Here she is,
Conchita! She just died today. Today? Are you kidding? Oh my God! What, oh that's totally
bizarre, wow. Oh, well you know, here's to Conchita. She was amazing. There is a really
great story associated with this picture and the next one. We were on a photo searching
trip in Texas. Driving from little town to little town looking for old photographs, and
we drive into a town called Del Rio, which is on the Mexican border. What was the town
in Mexico? Acuna. Acuna, and we didn't see any antique stores of trade shows or you know.
And I said, you know what, there is an old photo studio. Let's just go in there and see.
And there was an elderly woman behind the counter, and we said, we are looking for old
photographs. That's all we said. And so she pulled out all the photographs from the famous
flood of whatever, oh twelve where all the bridges in Del Rio blew over. And we said,
actually we're looking for photographs of people, specifically women. Do you have any
old photographs of women? And she said, "Oh, like this? Said, oh my God! So here we have
the one picture of Conchita, and the second picture. She was a matadora who retired at
the age of 28. After killing 800 bulls. She was a force to be reckoned with, and apparently
her ring was in Acuna, Mexico. So the pictures of her were made by the local photographer
in Texas. She was actually Chilean born, but, yeah. Wow. And here's Althea Gibson, first
tennis champion. It's really wonderful, all the pictures that we've seen of her she's
kissing a trophy! And here is oh, Sherman, this is just for you! This is Kitty Adams,
pro wrestler from Long Island! And in preparation for this picture, Sherman, we did a little
research. You can see a video of her on YouTube. OK. And then we move into the arts. And, you
want to talk about this? This is a tin type photograph. Tin types were introduced around
the time of the Civil War. They're those little silver pictures that you see that everybody
thinks are made of tin, when they're actually made of iron. They're unique; they're one
of a kind. And to find a picture where women are actively painting at their easels, again,
there's a kind of spontaneous element to a photograph like that. Tin types are on the
cusp of the sort of revolution of this staid, posed photographic image and the freer, liberated
photographic image. Have easel, will travel. Yeah, it's kind of wonderful because it's
like How did she get there? Yeah. If anybody knows the name of this artist, please raise
your hand. We got this picture, no information as to who she is, reputation, nothing. But
the notion of posing in her studio, what appears to be a fairly squalid studio, with her cherished
works of art. This is just, it's amazing! It's amazing to find anything like this of
there's President Washington on the rear wall. It's probably 1880's, 1890's. And a bottle
of wine on the floor! Or something stronger! You've got to get in the mood! I think it's
turpentine. And here's Mrs. Maxwell again in her studio creating her stuffed animals,
as it were. Actually there's a description of what she did at the Centennial Exhibition,
position let's see Oh, no, she was in the Kansas Colorado Building. And she did a Rocky
Mountains display that fascinated both the visitors and the press. She used paste, pulverized
ore, water, lime, gravel and evergreenas her construction materials. And she built a realistic
natural landscape in which to place all of her wildlife specimens which she, you know,
had personally killed and stuffed. Next here is Grandma Moses aka Anna Mary Robertson,
who started painting at the age of 78. Her first paintings were available for $2 a $3.
She was picked up by the Galerie St. Etienne which recognized her skills as a naīve folk
artist and the rest, as they say, is history. She worked in Maine, she worked in Upstate
New York and, again, this is a picture, an early color picture, by Harry Warnecke, a
Daily News photographer who did all the covers of the Rotogravures in the 30's, 40's and
50's in color. We haven't been able to identify which painting she's working on but there
she is! She worked for almost three decades and created 3,600 paintings. Oh! Wow! This
is a Brassi photograph of sculptures that the Academy Julienne in Paris in 1935. And
of course what's interesting about the context of this picture is, women were allowed to
model but they were not allowed to be students.This is a picture that's of after the school of
Thomas Aiken's. Again, the notion that a woman, young woman, would get undressed in the United
States in front of male students was pretty racy. And Thomas Aiken, as some of you may
know, was excoriated for not only allowing it but encouraging it and was forced to resign
his position at the Pennsylvania Academy of Arts. But this picture has a kind of visual
residence because there's the nude model next to the nude male figure. And this picture,
if we, if you have time. Might be a little familiar! Yeah, to look at the Burning Down
the House show. It's an icon of feminism, there's Carolee Schneemann. This is a Fluxus
event that she did in 1975 where she apparently came out fully dressed in an apron, started
to disrobe and eventually removes this scroll from her ***. There's a life-size photograph
of it in the exhibition next door. 1975. And this is the Guerrilla Girls, this is one of
the posters that they did. Of course, the only pictures you'll ever see of the Guerrilla
Girls are behind their guerrilla masks. So, we won't tell you who they are. And then we
transition to women with a camera! We start to see the camera get smaller, get lighter,
get easier to operate and in fact Kodak directs its advertising campaign to women! To homemakers,
to young women and there's a real resurgence of photographic practice that of course we
see to this day. These are the different Kodak cameras circa 1893, 1895, 1900. And there's
Kodak's logo in the lap of the woman at the right. See how easy it is? This is one of
our favorite pictures! So, this is a cross-cultural encounter where the photographer has shared
her camera with her subject who seems to be interested in taking the picture but he's
a little unclear about how to actually do it. We would love to be able to say this is
Margaret Niven but it isn't. No, we don't know. We don't know. And then we come to Queen
Victoria, who is a really important person in the history of photography. Who would have
thunk? In addition to ruling the world, she became an avid practitioner. There was a darkroom
at Buckingham Palace; she created scrapbooks of family events. I've been fortunate enough
to see some of them, stag hunts, birthday parties. The fact that she's posing with family
photographs on the table next to her. When her husband died, after Prince Albert's death
she wore a Gregorian bracelet, a memorial bracelet for the rest of her life honoring
him and just showing her citizenry, the relationship she had to photography. She championed it,
she practiced it, she made it popular, she made it fun. And we're looking for one of
her family albums, if you happen to have one. So, this is *** Fern. She was a writer and
she was the first woman to have her own column in 1852. And she was so good at it that by
1855 she was the highest paid writer in the United States. And she coined the expression
The way to a man's heart is through his stomach. Among many other wonderful quips. Here's Gertrude
Stein. A photograph that we actually can attribute to Carl Van Vechten, who was a very important
photographer of the Harlem Renaissance in the 1930s, knew everybody. This is actually
Stein in France, and Van Vechten got to travel around as well. And of course, she was daring
in her use of the English language. She really opened up literature, and through her own
salons, championed not only literature, but the visual arts. She and her brother had a
huge art collection. So, she was really daring in many ways, in her personal life, in her
career life. Who knows what she's writing? Maybe that's how. Who knows what she's writing?
It's so great. It's the vernacular counterpart. It's kind of like: There's Gertrude Stein,
and there's the woman in her kitchen. And she may have turned out to be. Who knows?
Now, this is a great segue. I just want you to know notice this. We go from the arts to
entertainment. OK. Here's this woman writer in her kitchen. And, here's the Presbyterian
kitchen band. And they really are playing pots and pans that are creatively reconfigured.
Samson and Delilah. Samson's the one with the hair. So, all we know is her name is Delilah.
Is it really Delilah, we don't really know? But she was a circus performer, and clearly
had a lovely relationship with her pet lion. And here's some more recent version of that.
Not so recent, but. This is Marie Rasmussen, who was associated with Ringling Brothers
Circus in the 1930s. You'll see that this is an actual performance. There are people
in the bandstand. If you look at the picture carefully, she's wearing a leopard scarf.
Which is a subtle threat, You guys behave. This is a real photo postcard of a sharpshooter.
The photographic techniques include pictures large and small. Real photo postcards were
introduced in the early 20th century. And guess what? You got to send your picture through
the mail. And we have a bunch of those, with identifying features. And this is Calamity
Jane. Her name was Martha Jane Cannary, and she was born in Missouri. We didn't write
this. This hard drinking woman wore men's clothing, used their body language, chewed
tobacco and was handy with a gun, I would say to say the least. She participated in
the Gold Rush. There's a wonderful book of Calamity Jane's letters to her daughter. So
I urge you to look into that. This is Mabel Strickland on Stranger. And she was a rodeo
rider, obviously. There's also a movie. Yes, the movie about.Oh, Calamity. with Doris Day.
Oh, absolutely. Actually, that was the first movie I ever saw, which was prophetic. I was
three years old. My father took me to the circus, and I was so terrified at the clowns.
I was shrieking. He took me out, and then we went to this movie. It was just a real
memorable first milestone in my life. Who knew? Oh, that's Mabel Strickland, again,
trick rider. See, you can also wear heels on a horse. But there's our favorite, Georgia
Sweet. She, again, was associated with. Ringling. Ringling Brothers Circus. She makes it look
so easy. This is *** Gorman, who was a strong woman. Somehow she lost her neck during her
career. It's depressing. I love this photo because of its depiction of family values.
Can we say she supports your family?
Now, we don't know anything about this, except she was a female escape artist. She's being
tied up and tossed into the water. I don't know, I guess she got out of it. She looks
a little suspect in that picture. And here's another water. Now, yes, here's an entertainer,
early entertainer. Of course, she's smoking, which was also a no, no. And she's dressed
sort of in circus regalia, but also a little cross- dressy. And apparently that was the
big Vaudeville thing - is for women to perform as men, which is ironic because the women's
parts in early theater were played by men. So here's a visual history of the bathing
suit. No high heels. This is one of my favorite pictures. It's a can-can photo of, again.
It's a small picture from the 1920s, snapshot, just really captures the outlandishness of
that dance. A Weegee photo of a stripper. After Weegee left New York and crime- scene-ville,
he went out to Hollywood and got into theatrical photography. And then, this is a snapshot
that somebody took at a family gathering, and here's the guest artist belly dancer.
And, of course, until very recent. Belly dancing is having a big resurgence right now. I have
to say that at the age of 62, I started taking belly dance lessons. But here, it was still
a little under on the risqué side. And here we have. Nothing to say about her, really.
She speaks for herself. She definitely speaks for herself. So this our segue into, you know,
we can call them bad girls or girls with an attitude. She's got a run in her stockings,
so she's got a bad attitude. Now we love this picture. I mean, is she bad? Of course, she's
not bad. But it's so about daring and the attitude of. Of what? I love this picture,
and I really don't know what to say about it. Now, she is bad, because she is smoking
in the garden while she's supposed to be serving dinner. And they're smoking, too. I don't
know if you can read that sign, but it says, No smoking or Talking. She's smoking a box
of cigars, which is still a no, no. And here is the bad girl of all bad girls. Mae West.
And she really was. I mean, she was tough and she was really smart, and she really ran
her own career. She did what she felt was right, no matter what. That's because she
was from Brooklyn. Here's a little dialogue going on. I don't know if it came to anything.
Now, this is a little series that we have here. And, of course, they are not bad girls,
and their attitude is not bad. But, this little series is of women who are really owning their
sexuality. Really owning it and displaying it and feeling really comfortable about it.
These are not ***, these were not paid models, these were not done to turn on men. This is
clearly for her partner in the privacy of her own bedroom. And, here's another one.
I love this picture. She is happy. Can you all read that, what it says? Erma the Body,
she says, We back our men in Vietnam. You're good neighbor policy in action. Now these
women were paid for sex. These are prostitutes in the red light district in Holland, Amsterdam.
Come up and see me some time. Disturbed, Lake Huntington, New York. Are they peeing? Yes,
they are peeing. And, this women is undressing, getting into the bath, and then on the toilet.
Sort of French Lartigue representation. Really, just, so intimate. Can you take our picture?
Bad girl. Really bad girl. You are such a bad girl. Are those French? No, these are
American. Again, amateur pictures. Caught in the act. Now, here we have a series of,
what we think, are lesbian depictions. We don't know if they are relationships or whatever.
It's odd; you don't see pictures like this. And you don't see pictures like this either.
We worked really hard finding these pictures. Isn't that sweet? Jitterbugging. Here's a
double wedding. United we stand, divided we fall. Now this is another segue. These are
our cross dressers. And, again, we don't know who they are or what their motive was, except
that this was dangerous to do in public. So, sometimes it's theatrically related, clearly
some of these are performers, probably college. party. And some of them aren't. Keep cool,
Palm Beach. And, here we go from the sublime. This is Poker Alice, who was also a Deadwood
celebrity. Lived in Deadwood at the same time as Calamity Jane. We're now in a new area
of the collection: criminals. She was a gambler, a bootlegger, a madam. And, apparently, as
a young woman, she was renowned for her beauty. We don't know who she is. It's Austin, Texas,
but that's all we know. This is Squeaky Fromme. Oh this is so bizarre. I didn't know, neither
one of us knew very much about her life, but as a young girl, she was a performer for a
popular local dance group called the Westchester Lariats which, in the late 1950s toured the
U.S. and Europe and appeared on the Lawrence Welk Show and at the White House. From then,
she fell into bad company, as it were, and drugs and so on. Took up with Charles Manson.
She was not involved in the taped murders, although she was arrested and imprisoned afterwards
for protesting Manson's jailing and so on, but those are very minor charges. But, then
she went on to attempt to assassinate President Ford. And was sentenced to prison for life
where she still lives. I don't know if you remember, those of you who can remember. There
were two assassination attempts on President Ford in 17 days, hers was the first. Woops.
No. They had nothing to do with that. And neither did she. Well, the caption to this
picture is actually kind of interesting. This is Rose Lemonya, who is in prison darning
the socks of her or darning the clothes of her 10 children while awaiting trial for the
*** of her husband. Here she is. Yes, OK. So, this is Sarah Jane Moore. The second person
to attempt to assassinate President Ford. He wasn't very popular with women somehow.
She was an FBI informer, who worked for one of the members of the Hurst family. Her story
is as convoluted and crazy as it gets and she is still in prison. No. She served 32
years, though. And this is M.E. Montague Harris, one of the co founders of the Simbanese Liberation
Army. Right. So they were behind the kidnapping of Patty Hurst, and she also served in jail.
They killed people, essentially. They robbed banks and they killed people. And here's Patty
herself, who was, of course, kidnapped by the army and then became a member and spent
two years in jail as a result of her activities and associations. And, she was given pardon
by Bill Clinton. Actually, her sentence was first commuted by Jimmy Carter, and then she
was completely forgiven by Bill Clinton. So, as you can see, the collection includes ephemera
as well as original photographs, because who wouldn't want a wanted poster. An original
Patty. once hung in the post office near you. So, these are Algerian freedom fighters, as
they would call themselves. This is a Soviet freedom fighter. A partisan milking her cow.
I love that picture. An anarchist. Ready to throw a hand grenade. And, what's interesting
here, is are these freedom fighters or are they terrorists? If you'd ask them, they would
consider themselves warriors for a cause, I'm sure. So, the pictures really depend on,
the interpretation really depends on who's looking and who's writing the history. What
does the writing. Yeah, this is a postcard that is heavily inscribed on the front and
the back. And even the depiction of this young woman, it's somewhat comprised, because, here
she is an anarchist with off at the shoulder blouse and kind of this very traditional depiction
of femininity. So now these are what we would call warriors. These are military women. This
is Pauline Cushman, who was a Union spy, transitioned from being an actress to working for the Union
Army. She went through the entire war without ever having been discovered to be a woman.
Patriotic figure from the First World War. This is the First World War, too. also, I
should say. This is what they called the *** troops in World War II. They're at ease here,
as you can see. They're at same sort of basic training camp. These are not at ease. This
is their first. Review. Yeah, their first review. And this is very current. This is
a young woman in Iraq. Now we get to women with a cause. And this is a photograph of
a painting. Some of the women in our collection are pre-photographic. So, the painting becomes
the record by which we recognize the figure, who was, in this case, Elizabeth Gurney Fry,
the angel of Newgate Prison, a social reformer in the UK, in the 1830s, 40s. She was a Quaker,
an American, and went to England and worked on prison reform. Quakers usually don't act
large. Their do-goodness is usually in small circles. She is just about the most famous
Quaker who had a large impact in the world around her. She was a prison reformer, and
in the prison, she did all this stuff for women in terms of childcare and education
and so on. She also set up this whole series of halfway houses for women who were trying
to come out. She called them the Newgate Association, and then they sprang up in prisons all the
over the United States and in Britain. And then. Oh, I'm sorry. I just wanted to say
one other thing. She was very influential to Florence Nightingale. And then, here's
Isabella Baumfree, Sojourner Truth, who, again, very active supporter of women's rights, equal
rights, and abolitionist movement. And how did she support herself? By selling this carte
de visite, this photograph, that was available at the lectures that she gave around the country,
and probably in Europe too. I sell the shadow to support the substance the shadow being
the photographic image. And
these are women's rights. They're wearing sashes Oh, no. I'm sorry. These are temperance.
The one on the left, it's hard to read, but it says, How dry I'm. And these are more reformers:
Isabella Somerset, Frances Willard, very active in the temperance movement. These were minor
royalty in England, too. They were duchess. And there is Mrs. Woodhull, sister of Tennie
Claflin. She was the first female candidate for president in the 1860s. And these little
cards, these business cards that people gave one another, were a form of portraiture for
everybody, know as carte de visite. Hers, of course, is stamped with her vocation. Broker.
Spiritualist, also proponent of free love. Susan B. Anthony, who was photographed by
Cirrone in New York City. These are a group of suffragettes in England being arrested
by bobbies. In my research I discovered that there was a difference between suffragists
and suffragettes. And it's interesting because suffragette sounds a little diminutive and
like it's not as important as a suffragist, but the suffragists were very moral, very
calm, very reasoned thinkers, and the suffragettes were very impatient for social change and
they believed in protest. Civil disobedience. Civil disobedience, they broke the law, they
were not opposed to violence in the name of the cause. And the headline on this newspaper
says, We Did It! Here we see another suffrage-related image. There's Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Seneca
Falls Commemorative. This is great. This is a union parade, and if you look at it really
carefully, they're all holding umbrellas and they're placed in such a way as that the umbrellas
create an American flag. The stars are in the upper right. And we were able to read
the billboard on the back that indicated it wasn't a suffrage parade, it was a union parade.
Yeah. Here's Jane Adams, founder of Hull House in Chicago very important pacifist, went with
Henry Ford to try to stop the First World War, involved in immigrant rights. First president
of the Ladies' Guild of Peace and Freedom, and one of the very first women to win a Nobel
Peace Prize. These are the first women. In Parliament. In Parliament in the UK. This
is what, 1920? Yeah. Eleanor Roosevelt at Plymouth Rock. Which they had to chain down
because they were afraid somebody was going to take the rock. Do you see that? Yeah. So
we all know about Eleanor, but she was called the First Lady of the World. She was the first
First Lady who had her own agenda and for decades after her husband died she continued
doing her own work for peace, freedom, equality, the rights of the poor. Women's rights. Definitely
women's rights. Oh I love this. This is Helen Keller at her Braille typewriter. And we couldn't
decide: should we put her in the arts? Where do we put her? But she was definitely a woman
with a cause. I don't know how she, I mean, she travelled around the world. She definitely
was a supporter of people with disabilities but she also worked for peace and freedom
and justice. She was a radical. She was not a liberal. She was a radical and was really
out there. She was actually an anarchist and it's funny because, I guess because of her
so-called disabilities, she was never called to task for it. But it's shocking, the things
that she has written and said. It's hard to believe. And this is an unknown peace protester.
We were able to get some of the old press pictures from an old neighborhood newspaper
in Greenpoint, New York, and this is a local protest against the incinerator in Greenpoint.
This is the Million Youth March, photo by Azeem Thomas. Bella Abzug for Congress. That's
Barbra Streisand behind her. Really? Dianne Feinstein, who did win the mayoral race and
her career is marked by many firsts. Yeah, she was the first female president of the
board of supervisors in San Francisco, San Francisco's first female mayor, the first
woman to serve in the senate from California, one of two female's Jewish senators, both
from California. First woman to serve on the senate judiciary committee, first woman to
chair the senate rules committee and the senate intelligence committee, and maybe we will
be the first, you know what? Here is Shirley Chisholm; she was congress woman for seven
terms. She also ran for president of the United States and received 152 first valid votes
at the 1972 convention. And isn't that. oh never mind. And here we all know, this is
Princess Diana of Wales, who really it would have been fascinated to see how she would
have matured because she certainly was going in the right direction in terms of a woman
with a cause or many causes. Seems to be in Ney York city. Right. And here, our final
image is of Linda Carter as wonder woman and what we discovered is that 'wonder woman'
is of course in Amazon. Read this whole thing, it's really good. The all female tribe of
amazons and was sent to the man's world as an ambassador. Among the amazons, she is known
as Princess Diana, being the daughter of the Amazon queen hippolyta. But in the man's world
she takes on the secret identity of Diana prince. Her powers include super strength,
hand to hand combat and flight. She also makes use of her lasso of truth, which forces those
bound by it to tell the truth, a pair of bullet deflecting bracelets and an invisible plane.
So, on that note, we thank you and Thank you. Then I just like to add a note of where do
we go from here, and I would like to say look around because the whole world is in our hands.
I think we have time for a few questions. Are there two or three that anybody would
like to, yes, in the back please? I just wanted to say that wonder woman's bracelets are made
of Feminum. Thank you. Also let's not forget. Dara Birnbaum of course has done the infamous
wonder woman which was one of the very first videos that was ever done as video art and
women have not been really recognized for their very early work in videos in medium
for art. And our next exhibition actually that's going to be coming up here is going
to be on a woman's video and so will one of Derra, so will wonder woman be available.
Yes, any other? There was another question, yes, Christina. It's not a question. I was
very inspired by this. Thank you, Christina. So thank you all, I apologize again for those
who couldn't get seats and I would like to go over one more time, the schedule for coming
month because March, in addition to being our second anniversary is also a women's history
month. And next weekend, actually, Faye Wattleton is coming and she is a women's right activist
and president of the Center for the Advancement of Women and she is going to be talking on
feminist issues. First Saturday, we have Diane Wolkstein coming and the Young Voices Talk
for younger women and gallery talk by Nicole Caruth who was the co-curator of Burning Down
the House which is out now. I hope you've had a chance to see it. We are going to have
on the 14th, the Feminist Archeology by Ellen Belcher and Diana Craig Patch. And then on
the 15th, Rusty Kanokogi, I can never say her name correctly. And she is fabulous. She
is the Mother of Women's Judo. And she will be here to speak about her trailblazing entrance
at the competitive world of judo. She disguised herself as a man and she actually won an Olympic
medal which was stripped from her at the point that the Olympic committee discovered that
she was a woman. But she really opened the doors in the Olympics for women to enter in.
So, I would encourage you to hear her. She is quite marvelous and she hasn't been well
lately. So the fact that she is coming with the Power Point is part of what's keeping
her alive at the moment. And it will be really an unusual opportunity to hear from this incredible
octogenarian trailblazer. And then I hope you will join us for the second anniversary
which is going to be on March 21st. It's going to be by extension downstairs in the auditorium.
And about a year and a half ago, I put together a think tank that we titled Unfinished Business.
And we are a corporate of women inter-generational and diverse, identifying ways of mobilizing
external networks and raising public awareness about inter-generational communications and
issues of course of race, class, gender and the effects of current events on women and
children. And we are calling it a speak out because that is what it is going to be. It's
a vision for the nation, what is it going to take. It is going to be moderated by a
very fantastic Laura Flanders who you may know from GRIT TV and Nicole Mason who was
Women of Color Policy Network, is going to be doing our keynote. Ana Oliveira who is
New York Women Foundation and Ai-Jen Poo from Domestic Workers United are going to be our
respondents. Tony Blackman who is from Brooklyn is going to be doing a performance and closing
remarks by Liz Abzug, daughter of course, of our great Bella Abzug. And those who have
been involved with Unfinished Business include Liz Abzug, Sharna Goldseker, Sarah Gold, Ms.
Foundation, Mia Harden, Third Wave Foundation, Carol Jenkins, The Women's Media Foundation,
and Monique Meta who is an independent consultant at this point. Benita Miller, she is from
the Brooklyn's Young Mother's Collective. And, Amy Sananman from here Brooklyn's Groundswell
Community Mural Project. We will be having a reception here in the center afterwards
and also be doing a group mural which will be sponsored by Groundswell after that. And
then we have the following day, A.I.R Kat Griefen and Ferris Olin who many of you are
surely familiar with, are going to be moderating a panel, The Market: Women Artists from Collection
to Cultural Records, strategies which would ensure women artists a place in the cultural
record. Panelists include Debra Harris, Claire Oliver, Sue Scott, and Deepanjana Klein. And
if you haven't had enough by that time, our month ends on the 28th with a symposium. And
it is Feminism Now: New Feminist Art Scholarship. And we would be highlighting the work for
the entire day on Saturday, the 28th, of emerging graduates and post graduate students and scholars
who will be presenting their groundbreaking research on a wide array obviously of issues.
And it will be moderated by the wonderful Carrie Lovely. So I hope you can join us.
And I want to thank the two of you because this was absolutely fantastic and inspirational.
Really wonderful and thank you very much. It was exciting on so many levels, historic,
visual. I think it really gives all of us a great deal of enthusiasm to forge ahead
and I thank all of you for coming and making it such a wonderful presentation as well.
Thank you very much.