International Women’s Day and Women’s History Month TFI Digital Archive Selections

But in a time of DEI rollbacks, rising conservatism, and widespread misinformation, the feminist historical record is at risk of being erased. Independent feminist archives are the antidote.

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This piece of ephemera is from Dindga McCannon’s Capsule Collection. McCannon recalls Sisterfire as one of the most welcoming spaces to sell her art and clothing. At the time, it was one of the only festivals by women and for women, with the lesbian community playing a large role in its organization. The program’s booklet spans 20 pages of performer line-ups, event details, and advertisements from aligned organizations.

This photograph, from the Mary Beth Edelson Collection, captures the Women’s Action Coalition (WAC) marching in the 1992 New York City Pride March, the same year the group was founded. WAC took inspiration from ACT UP and Women’s Health Action Mobilization for their sit-ins, educational campaigns, and direct actions. The group utilized art to amplify their message and to challenge the misogyny, racism, and homophobia of the mainstream art world.

In December 1987, Mary Beth Edelson, Gloria Orenstein, Clive Philpot, Elinor Gadon, Hank Gile, and Maura Sheehan performed a healing ritual for Carolee Schneemann at Mary Beth Edelson’s studio on 110 Mercer Street, New York, NY.

As a feminist artist, Edelson often staged her performance art in nature, incorporating goddess imagery to connect to women’s empowerment and feminine energy. She and Schneemann were part of a cohort known as, “first generation feminist-artists.”

This ritual exemplifies the embodiment of feminist art and performance as a medium. It began with Schneemann changing her clothes and meditating alone, while the others discussed the ritual steps, such as noise-making, and practiced.

During the ritual, the group read from Descent to the Goddess, by Sylvia Perera, a text that explores women’s freedom and moving away from male domination.

Following the reading, the group performed a collective wounding to explore loss and darkness as a means to release.

After the collective wounding, the group covered Schneemann and let her speak on loss as she needed to, whether this was telling her story, crying, or screaming. When she was done, the group washed her wounds, and their own, using soap that “opened channels.” They then wore wound bracelets to symbolize the gradual fading of hurt. To close out, the group cut-off Schneeman’s black clothes to reveal a new “skin” (set of clothes, seen above) to embody rebirth.

Combat Zone: Campaign HQ Against Domestic Violence (1994) was a participatory art project by Mary Beth Edelson, housed at Creative Time. Created in response to the “war zone” that abused women endure, the installation was designed to inspire action. It offered counseling, self-defense workshops, lectures, a hotline, and media resources, making it both an artistic and activist space.

Edelson, known for integrating performance and activism into her work, naturally extended these elements into Combat Zone, which challenged the viewer to confront domestic abuse rather than passively observe. This blend of artistic practice and feminist activism was also evident in her Story Gathering Boxes project, which collected and shared women’s personal narratives.

This ephemera, digitized and collected by Gwen Shockey, is from the Addresses Project which is an organization that investigates lesbian and queer space and memory in New York City from the early 1900s to the present day. This scan in particular is a Polaroid taken at a lesbian party thrown by Wanda Acosta and Sharee Nash called “No Day Like Sunday.” Acosta, a nightlife icon, creator of parties like Indulgence at Casa La Femme, Pleasure at Bar d’O, Kitty Glitter at Liquids, and so many more, owned many lesbian bars that pushed lesbian culture into “visible and glamorous” spaces. It allowed queer women to see each other and themselves with “respect and adoration.” By creating a queer and lesbian multidisciplinary platform through intergenerational community building and place-based heritage, Gwen Shockey uses the memory and portraiture components to document and archive lesbain and queer moments in NYC’s history.

Selection and description by Spring 2025 CUNY Cultural Intern, Journey Ford.

This photo captures a pro-choice rally countering Operation Rescue, an anti-abortion group founded in 1986 that had blocked the entrance to a women’s health clinic in Queens, New York. Feminist activists, clinic defenders, and reproductive rights groups such as the National Organization for Women (NOW) and Women’s Health Action and Mobilization (WHAM!) rallied in large numbers to fiercely defend reproductive rights. This action was part of a national resistance against Operation Rescue, contributing to the passage of the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances (FACE) Act in 1994, which made it illegal to block clinic access. This photo was taken by Donna Binder, a photojournalist and entrepreneur with over 25 years of experience in creating, distributing, and fundraising for social justice and cultural projects.

Part of the Estate of Phyilis Krim includes a cassette holding the recording of “An Alternate View of Women’s Imagery: The Artist as an Individual” of a panel discussion Krim organized. Phyllis Krim was best known for her allegorical paintings of classic cars symbolizing power, beauty, and strength during the 60s and 70s. During the screening of her documentary, “Driving Passion (1975),” and her solar exhibition, “Classic Cars and Other Machines(1976),” this discussion was moderated and held at NYU’s Loeb Student Center(1976) by Louise Bourgeois, with speakers including Phyllis Krim, Bruce Barton, Ernest Briggs, Corinne Robins, and Deborah Remington.

Her works being prized, as well as being broadcasted on Manhattan Cable Television, Krim opened a space for her signature artistic style and was the first and only woman invited to be a charter member of the Automotive Fine Arts Society in 1986 for her creative outlook of the beauty in mechanical objects.

Selection and description by Spring 2025 CUNY Cultural Intern, Journey Ford.