Alice Austin was one of the first female photographers in America, and she started at only ten years old. She lived from 1866 to 1952 and was unusual for her time because she worked outside a photography studio and took pictures of normal day to day life. She took pictures of her family and friends, women\u2019s social activities, sports, homes, nature, immigrants, and different parts of life around New York City. She portrayed women living more independently than what was considered normal during the Victorian era. She took pictures of social activities and everyday life to show what living during that time was like. The subjects of the photographs are important in 2026 because they show what everyday life in New York looked like over 100 years ago. It gives us a better understanding and allows us to see how much society has changed since then. She photographed ordinary people, women, relationships and things that we don\u2019t see and learn from history. Her pictures show details including the way people dressed, socialized, and traveled. They show how women had stricter social expectations than they do today. Some women are naturally posing, standing close together, or doing things that were not so ordinary to do at the time. This shows us that regardless of the strict rules and expectations society had towards women, they still found ways to be independent and express themselves. Today, people usually dress more casually and women have much more freedom to choose how they act, dress, and express themselves. Her pictures are important because pictures back then were rare, and today we can just take out a phone and post a picture anywhere we are. One photograph that stood out to me was Alice on fence point. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Alice Austen is doing something that was not considered proper at the time by sitting on top of a fence post while Gertrude Tate watches. She did not seem to be afraid to do something that goes against the societal expectations of women. She was willing to climb a fencepost, carry heavy photography equipment, and work outside instead of conforming to the normal social roles of women at the time. She did not care if climbing the fence would expose her ankles, even though this was considered improper for women during this time. Today, people stand by that idea and still find it important to express themselves regardless of what society has to say about it. Women also have much more freedom in the way they behave and dress today. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Alice Austin was one of the first female photographers in America, and she started at only ten years old. She lived from 1866 to 1952 and was unusual for her time because she worked outside a photography studio and took pictures of normal day to day life. She took pictures of her family and friends,… Continue Reading →<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1428,"featured_media":378,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"portfolio_post_id":0,"portfolio_citation":"","portfolio_annotation":"","openlab_post_visibility":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-377","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-alice-austen","clear"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/openlab.macaulay.cuny.edu\/shelby26\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/377","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/openlab.macaulay.cuny.edu\/shelby26\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/openlab.macaulay.cuny.edu\/shelby26\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/openlab.macaulay.cuny.edu\/shelby26\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1428"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/openlab.macaulay.cuny.edu\/shelby26\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=377"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/openlab.macaulay.cuny.edu\/shelby26\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/377\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":380,"href":"https:\/\/openlab.macaulay.cuny.edu\/shelby26\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/377\/revisions\/380"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/openlab.macaulay.cuny.edu\/shelby26\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/378"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/openlab.macaulay.cuny.edu\/shelby26\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=377"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/openlab.macaulay.cuny.edu\/shelby26\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=377"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/openlab.macaulay.cuny.edu\/shelby26\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=377"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}