So my photography lecture about The Trailblazers went well yesterday,  despite a relatively sparse turnout (11 people, including the organizer, her intern, and Chris.) Ah well. People speculated that perhaps it was scheduled (by the group that hosted the talk) too early in the evening, plus this week was perhaps bad timing with it being too close to Christmas, when people have other holiday commitments.  On the upside, the people who came all really enjoyed it and asked good questions. So, I had a very good time.

My talk covered 4 women who were active as a professional photographers in the early 20th century: Getrude Käsebier, Imogen Cunningham, Margaret Bourke-White, and Berenice Abbott. All were talented and artistic, and they all forged successful careers at a time when societal norms dictated behavior for what respectable women should and should not do. For example:

• Nice girls don’t go to strange parts of town or to places where only men are allowed.
• Nice girls don’t leave their husband and children behind to go off to college and then work outside the home.
• And nice girls mostly certainly don’t take photos of naked men.

But these four women didn’t worry about any of that when it came to their photography.

Case in point: In the 1930s, Berenice Abbott was working on a project she called Changing New York, taking photos all over New York City. She finally secured funding to complete it from a U.S. government program called the Federal Art Project (FAP). There was a condition for getting the money, though: she had to meet regularly with a FAP representative so he could check her work and monitor her progress.

One day she showed up with the most recent set of photos she’d taken.  He looked at the photos, and then looked up at her and said:  “Miss Abbott, these are photos from the Bowery!  Nice girls don’t go to Bowery!”

She famously replied:  “I’m not a nice girl, I’m a photographer.”

Great comeback from a great photographer. It was truly great fun to be able to share interesting photos and stories like that one last night with my small, but select audience. Lecture circuit, here I come … well, unless you have to be a nice girl to get onto one, of course.

I am, after all, a photographer now.   😉