24-Hour Web Conference to Celebrate Women in Photography Worldwide

To celebrate International Women's Day, Kris Belden-Adams, UM associate professor of art history, and Rose Teanby, a photographic historian in Nottingham, United Kingdom, are co-organizing the first-ever Women of Photography 24-Hour Conference-A-Thon. The event is free and begins at 6:01 p.m. CST on Friday (March 7).

Open to anyone interested in photography and women's impact on the practice, the daylong web symposium will feature 58 presentations from experts across the globe, ranging from photographers and researchers to collectors, historians and attorneys.

"I hope the conference displays that women were critical to the beginnings of photography, its growth throughout the world and to sustaining it and making it an important mass medium today," Belden-Adams said.

"But I also hope that it's the beginning of a conversation that continues and isn't just confined to 24 hours."

With speakers representing every continent except Antarctica, the first presentations will be shared from New Zealand and Australia. The geographic locations of each speaker or session topic will progress west before ending in the U.S.

Jillian Edelstein, an international award-winning photographer, and Katherine Manthorne, professor emerita of art history at City University of New York's Graduate Center, are the event's keynote speakers.

"For a short amount of time during the conference, it will be International Women's Day for the entire globe," Belden-Adams said. "We'll recognize that while it's happening by putting up some world clocks and encouraging everybody to use a name plate that shows the time where they are."

The sessions champion the work of female trailblazers, highlight their creative techniques for visual storytelling and provide important context to bring a greater appreciation to women's work worldwide – even for those who worked behind the scenes.

"This conference is a clear indication that photography has very few boundaries and has touched people of different nationalities and cultures around the world, speaking a universal language without words," said Teanby, who earned her doctorate in photographic history from De Montfort University in Leicester, England.

"That is definitely something to celebrate."

A Royal Photographic Society fellow and Royal Historical Society associate fellow, Teanby focuses her work on the earliest British female photographers. Her efforts have helped give a louder voice to stories of women's work from 1839 to 1861.

After receiving more than 80 proposal submissions for presentations, both Teanby and Belden-Adams admit they have learned new things about women's contributions to the field. The conference was created to give the world access to more of that history, they said.

"As a specialist in women's photographic history, I have been astounded and delighted by the number of unfamiliar female photographers featured in the conference from all corners of the globe," Teanby said.

"I hope that the positive impact of women's photographic contributions will permeate into many avenues of new scholarship, into blogs and articles – or even high school debates."

Registration is open to join the online Women in Photography event and explore the experiences, legacies and challenges of women in photography. Teams from the Ole Miss Office of Information Technology, J.D. Williams Library and Department of Art and Art History have provided services and resources to support the event.

Top: Graphic by Tyler Barnes/UM Department of Art and Art History