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Anna Atkins is one of the most well-known female photographers in history. Atkins was an accomplished illustrator who specialized in botanical art. She began using photographic technology to combine art and science. Atkins used cyanotype photographic processes to accurately document botanical species, with a great focus on algae. Cyanotype photography entails placing an object on chemically saturated paper, leaving it to dry, and then placing it in the sun, where the UV rays react with the chemicals to create a cyan-blue background. In 1843, Anna Atkins published over 400 of her own highly detailed botanical images in her book, titled Photographs of British Algae: Cyanotype Impressions. Atkin's photographs were the first to ever be published as an illustrated book and were recognized for bringing new opportunities to study rare algae and other botanical species with the revolutionary accuracy from her images.

Sources:

Bagnall, L. (2023, February 28). Cyanotypes: The Origins of Photography. Kew. https://www.kew.org/read-and-watch/cyanotype-photography#:~:text=Cyanotype%20photography%20is%20a%20camera,white%20and%20Prussian%20blue%20images.

Lotzof, K. (n.d.). Anna Atkins and the first book of Photographs. Natural History Museum. https://www.nhm.ac.uk/discover/anna-atkins-cyanotypes-the-first-book-of-photographs.html

Sofia Stefano

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Christina Broom capturing her photographs 

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Christina Broom became one of the first female press photographers and is known for taking some of the best photographs of the Suffragettes, members of the militant Women’s Social and Political Union. These women were fighting for the right to vote. One of the earliest of these pictures can be found in the Museum of London. Christina Broom taught herself how to be a commercial photographer when her husband injured himself and could not work. She made a good living and the suffragettes became an important subject in her photography work. She stopped photographing the women’s suffrage movement in the summer of 1913, however no one knows exactly why she stopped. Some believe that her other work was earning her more money or the change of newspaper coverage was the cause of her switch.

source: Atkinson, D. (2019, August 14). March of the women: photographing the suffragettes. Museum of London. https://www.museumoflondon.org.uk/discover/march-women-photographing-suffragettes-broom

Adriana Doganieri

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Gerda Taro is known as the first war photojournalist, however not by her name. Rather she was known under the name Robert Capa. This was the name that she and her husband created. They worked to create the famous Robert Capa who was a famous and rich American photographer. The husband would take the photos and Gerda would sell these photos as Capa’s originals. She convinced the publishers that their photos were worth a higher expense than usual. Later they split in their photography roles and she signed her own contract with a Persian newspaper. Sometimes she would signature Capa’s name with her own signature. She believed that she had to get close enough to the action of the battle lines in order to get a good photo. During the Spanish civil war a fleeing tank accidentally hit her and she became the first photojournalist to die on the front lines of war.

source: Flores, J. F. (2023, August 1). Gerda Taro, La Prima fotoreporter di guerra. Storica. https://www.storicang.it/a/gerda-taro-prima-fotoreporter-di-guerra_16296

Adriana Doganieri

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Migrant Mother- a photograph that Dorothea Lange captured 

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Dorothea Lange was a photographer who visited migrant farm camps while working for the FSA in California. In March 1936 in Nipomo, California, Dorothea Lange she took a picture of a composed Migrant Mother who was at one of the migrant camps. After this photo was taken, Lange and her editors alerted federal authorities and food was rushed to the camp. This migrant, later known as Florence Owens Thompson, survived the Depression and raised her children in California. She had avoided publicity until 1978 because she was ashamed. This was because through the picture she was seen as being an icon of poverty.

source- Kovarik, B. (2016). Photography: giving vision to history. In Revolutions in communication (2nd ed., pp. 166–167). Bloomsbury.

Adriana Doganieri

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Margaret Bourke-White was already famous at this time from her photos of the "dust bowl" of Oklahoma. However, she is also known for her documentation of the liberation of Buchenwald concentration camp (1945). These pictures of the concentration camp drew in so much attention because of how grim it was that Dwight Eisenhower toured the camps to confirm that it was real. She is also known for taking a simple portrait of Mahatma Gandhi in 1946. She was also the first photographer for Fortune magazine, the first Western professional photographer allowed into the Soviet Union , Life magazine's first female photographer, and the first female war correspondent allowed to work in combat zones during WWII.

sources: Kovarik, B. (2016). Photography: giving vision to history. In Revolutions in communication (2nd ed., pp. 169). Bloomsbury.

Brennan, B. W. (2014). Margaret Bourke-White (1904-1971). Prints & Photographs Reading Room. https://www.loc.gov/rr/print/coll/womphotoj/bourkewhiteessay.html#:~:text=Margaret%20Bourke%2DWhite%20was%20a,zones%20during%20World%20War%20II.

Adriana Doganieri

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While there are a few possible answers for who the first female photographer in history is, Sarah Anne Bright is known for capturing the first surviving photograph ever taken by a female. Pictured above is Bright's The Quillan Leaf, a photogram that was made without the use of a camera but with photographic materials in 1839. This image was created by placing a real leaf onto paper covered with silver nitrate, which is extremely light-sensitive and reacts to UV rays, creating the image we see. The Quillian Leaf was originally given credit to William Henry Fox Talbot, and then to Thomas Wedgewood, who were two profound male photographers in photography's early stages. However, it was not until 2015 that Sarah Anne Bright's initials were discovered on the original image, and she was finally given credit for her work. There is little known about Bright's life, though it is known that she spent much of her life experimenting with photography and watercolor art.

Constance Fox Talbot, wife of William Henry Fox Talbot, is also considered as possibly the first female photographer. This is not a far-fetched assumption, as Constance Fox Talbot had access to photographic equipment, and it was easy for her to learn from her husband and experiment on her own. However, there is no proof that she took the first female-produced photograph, therefore leaving the title to Sarah Anne Bright.

Sources:

The first women of Photography. (n.d.). Europeana. https://www.europeana.eu/en/exhibitions/a-female-lens/the-first-women-of-photography

Unearthing the world’s first female photographers. (2021, February 1). Dulwich Picture Gallery. https://www.dulwichpicturegallery.org.uk/about/news-blog/2021/february/unearthing-the-worlds-first-female-photographers/

Sofia Stefano

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Julia Margaret Cameron was a mother to six children, who received her first camera at 48 years old as a gift from one of her children. Her daughter and son-in-law gifted her this camera in hopes of providing her with a new hobby now that her children were all grown up. Living in an area filled with social elites and celebrities in Britain, Cameron took photos of anyone who would let her. Julia Margaret Cameron is best known for self-portraits in which she posed her subjects to create symbolic scenes. Some of the most notable of Cameron's photographic subjects include Sir John Herschel, Thomas Carlyle and Charles Darwin. Despite Cameron's success with photographing well-known individuals, she received much criticism from other photographers for her poor photographic techniques in which many of her photos were out of focus, lenses were cracked, or her fingerprints could be seen in the image. However, critics later praised her choice to value artistic meaning over visual perfection.

Sources:

Encyclopædia Britannica, inc. (n.d.). Julia Margaret Cameron. Encyclopædia Britannica. https://www.britannica.com/biography/Julia-Margaret-Cameron

Gaylord, K., & Newhall, N. (2016). Julia Margaret Cameron. MoMA. https://www.moma.org/artists/932

Sofia Stefano

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Mary Steen was a Danish photographer who opened her first photographic studio in the city-center of Copenhagen, Denmark, at the age of 28. She specialized in capturing indoor environments, which was exceptionally impressive due to the lack of indoor electrical light during this time. Steen's photographs were some of the first images to exhibit people inside their homes and to be published in the Illusteret Tidende magazine. In 1888, Mary Steen became the first female photographer in court and was the photographer for Princess Alexandra. By 1895, Steen was invited to London to take photos of the members of the royal family inside the Windsor Castle, including the queen at the time, Queen Victoria.

Sources:

Royal Collection Trust. Mary Steen (1856–1939). (n.d.). https://www.rct.uk/collection/stories/women-photographers/mary-steen-1856-1939

MONOVISIONS. Biography: 19th century Danish photographer Mary Steen: Monovisions - Black & White Photography Magazine. MONOVISIONS. (2019, July 7). https://monovisions.com/biography-19th-century-photographer-mary-steen/

Sofia Stefano

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Virginia Shau became the first woman and second amateur to win the Pulitzer Prize in photography (US). The award-winning photograph was taken in Redding, California, at the Pit River Bridge and was titled "Rescue on Pit River Bridge” and was actually taken on a Kodak Brownie camera, and what the camera captured was jaw-dropping; a truck driver being rescued from his cab which was dangling over the edge of a bridge in California. On  3 May 1953, one of two drivers who was trapped in the cab, Paul Overby, was being pulled up, by a rope, on the Pit River Bridge in California. The second driver, Hank Baum, was rescued moments before the cab fell onto the rocks underneath. Virginia was actually on a fishing trip with her husband when she witnessed the incident. Her husband along with another motorist helped rescue the drivers and bring them to safety. Her husband and another motorist rescued the drivers.

https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/picture/2013/jun/12/rescue-on-pit-river-bridge-photography

Natalie Huber

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AP photographer Nick Ut took a famous picture of children fleeing from a village in Vietnam in June of 1972 but editors debated whether or not to use it because it showed a young girl (Phan Thj Kim Phuc) whose clothes had been burned off by Napalm. AP editors decided that the news value outweighed modesty. After taking the photo, Ut took the girl to the hospital and remained in touch with her over the years as she found a new life (pg 175) Because of this photo captured by Nick Ut, Kim Phúc became a symbol of resilience and hope. Despite the immense pain and trauma she endured from being the subject of one of the most iconic war photographs in history, she has dedicated her life to advocating for peace, forgiveness, and reconciliation. She went on to become a UNESCO Goodwill Ambassador and the founder of The KIM Foundation International, which is a foundation created in order to help other children who were, like herself, a victim of war. Through her foundation, Kim is able to provide hope for those in need. Despite the hardships she faced after the Napalm attack in Vietnam, including numerous surgeries and physical pain, she has used her platform to spread messages of peace and healing, sharing her story around the world. She also places a strong emphasis on the importance of forgiveness and understanding, even towards those who caused her suffering. Kim Phúc's commitment to promoting peace and reconciliation is not only inspiring but also a testament to the power of compassion and forgiveness in overcoming struggles.

https://kimfoundation.com/

Natalie Huber

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1. Lynsey Addario is a Pulitzer Prize winner as well as a New York Times best-selling author who has covered some of the world's most urgent humanitarian and human rights crises. Through her work across the Middle East, South Asia, and Africa, she has been able to document some of the daunting and crucial moments. From her documentation of Afghanistan under the Taliban immediately before and after the 9/11 attacks, Iraq following the US-led invasion and dismantlement of Saddam Hussein’s government, and western Sudan in the aftermath of the genocide in Darfur, “she has captured through her photographs visual testimony not only of war and injustice but also of humanity, dignity, and resilience.”

https://www.lynseyaddario.com/of-love-war

Natalie Huber

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Ami Vitale is one of the most incredible photographers of our time. Throughout the years, she has lived in huts and war zones, captured malaria, and donned a panda suit, all for her love for photography. What makes her photos so incredible is by keeping true to herself and implementing her method of “living the story”. She is also a Nikon, Canson Infinity and Luminar Neo Ambassador, as well as a photographer, writer, documentary filmmaker, and speaker for National Geographic. In doing so, she has traveled to over 100 countries and has documented some of the heartbreaking realities of war as well as the courageous and inspiring power that humans have to make a difference.

Ami Vitale

Natalie Huber

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Having a career spanning more than five decades, Leibovitz has photographed everyone from Leonardo DiCaprio to Queen Elizabeth II. Today, she is known as the most famous female photographer of this time. She has a keen skill for capturing her subject’s personality and inner life. Her images reflect intimate or staged moments that reveal the playful and expressive aspects of her models. It all began in 1970, when she started working as a commercial photographer at Rolling Stone magazine, and soon became the first woman to be named chief photographer. Soon after, she left the publication and began working at Vanity Fair where she developed her style of staged and brightly lit portraits, and today, still regularly contributes to the magazine, as well as to Vogue. Then in 1991, she became the first woman ever to have a solo exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery in Washington, D.C. To this day, her art hangs in the Art Institute of Chicago, The Museum of Modern Art in New York, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, along with plenty others. Though she has collected many accomplishments and recognition along the way, she still continues to live and work in New York City, continuing to live out her passion for photography.

“I no longer believe that there is such a thing as objectivity,” she once said. “Everyone has a point of view. Some people call it style, but what we’re really talking about is the guts of a photograph. When you trust your point of view, that’s when you start taking pictures.”

https://www.artnet.com/artists/annie-leibovitz/

Natalie Huber