Women - Women's Innovations

Berenice Abbott

📷 Photography 💡 Inventor

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📷 Photography 💡 Inventor

Studied sculpture & theater in Paris
Took portraits of people in the arts & literary worlds like Jean Cocteau & James Joyce
Was an apprentice to Man Ray
Preserved the works of Eugene Atget
Documented changes in NY through pictures
Travelled US 1 from Florida to Maine taking over 2500 pictures of antebellum architecture & automobile related architecture
Invented a distortion enlarging easel & the telescopic lighting pole (now called autopole)
Produced photos for a physics textbook
Held 4 patents

Born: 1898

Country: USA

Education: 2 semesters at Ohio State University; Academie de la Grande Chaumiere; Prussin Academy of Arts

Rediet Abebe

💻 Computer Science 🤖 Artificial Intelligence

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Anna Goldwater Alexander

🎨 Art Photograhy

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Linda Marie Allen

🎨 Environmental Design 🎨 Interior Design

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Marin Alsop

🎵 Music

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🎵 Music

Began playiong the piano at age 2 & the violin at 5
Both her parents were string musicians
2007 was 1 of 8 conductors of British orchestras to endorse the 10-year classical manifesto "Building on Excellence: Orchestras for the 21st Century" which called for the increased presence of classical music in the UK & giving all British schoolchildren free admission to a classical music concert; has been nominated for 4 Grammys & 1 Emmy
her discography comprises over 200 titles
The Conductor is a documentary of her life which premiered at the 2021 NY Tribeca Film Festival
She was inspired to become a conductor by Leonard Bernstein; won a Bernstein Fellowship & ultimately was his student

Born: 1956

Country: USA

Education: Julliard School Pre-College Division 1972; originally attended Yale University as a Mathematics major but transferred to Juilliard in 1975 where she earned a BM 1977 & a MM 1978 both in the Violin

Blanche Ames Ames

🔍 Botanical Illustrator 🎨 Artist 🔍 Suffragette 💡 Inventor

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🔍 Botanical Illustrator 🎨 Artist 🔍 Suffragette 💡 Inventor

designed and created plans for many of the dams and ponds surrounding her home at Borderland
worked on ways to breed a more disease-resistant turkey
was president of her college graduating class
illustrated her husband's botanical research on orchids
her family estate, Borderland, is now a State Park opened to the public in Massachusetts
hired a newspaper clipping service to save suffrage news from 1915 to 1916
designed the orchid decorations on the graves of her husband & herself
during the 1910s she produced a number of political cartoons promoting women's suffrage, which appeared in publications including Woman's Journal, and the Boston American
her work called, "Cradle of Liberty", was selected to be Massachusetts' suffrage poster
her etchings are on display at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and her oil painting can be seen at Harvard, Dartmouth, and Columbia University
supported birth control
held patents for inventions which included a hexagonal lumber cutter and a method for entrapping enemy aircraft
at age 80 wrote a biography about her father, Adelbert Ames, called: "Adelbert Ames, 1835-1933; General, Senator, Governor, the story of his life and times and his integrity as a soldier and statesman in the service of the United States of America throughout the Civil War and in Mississippi in the years of Reconstruction" (1964)
had an athletic childhood & learned golf, tennis, football and sailing
created formulas for spermicidal jellies and provided instructions on how to make a diaphragm by using such everyday objects as a baby’s teething ring
established a fund in her name for the medical education of women at the New England Hospital for Women and Children
designed and the abandoned a swimming pool at Borderland with pipes so complicated that the secret of their operation died with her
husband was a botanist who discovered over 1,000 new species of orchids in the Caribbean, the Philippines, & Central & South American which she drew & illustrated for his 7-volume compendium of orchids
was arrested after carving a wooden penis & using it to demonstrate proper condom usage in the middle of boston's busy Commonwealth Avenue
the Ames Charts of Economic Plants she created for herhusband's botany classes are still in use today
designed Borderland which was the family home until her death & was featured in the 2019 movie "Knives Out"

Born: 1878

Country: USA

Education: Smith College & School of Art AB Art History 1899

Donna Auguste

💻 Computer Science 🤖 Artificial Intelligence

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💻 Computer Science 🤖 Artificial Intelligence

At Apple developed Newton personal digital assistant (PDA)
She & her 4 sisters were raised by her single mother
As a child she liked to take things (doorbells & appliances) apart to see how they worked
1st female African-American to attend the PhD program at Carnegie-Mellon University
After working at IntelliCorp on AI, she took 2 months off to bicycle through the countryside of Japan
1996, co-founded Freshwater Software Inc & took it from a small startup to a nationally recognized multimillion dollar software provider; 2001 sold the company to Mercury Interactive Corporation of California for $147 million
Retired in 2001 & founded Leave a Little Room Foundation, LLC; it provides housing, electricity & vaccinations to poor & underprivileged communities around the world
Holds 14 patents

Born: 1958

Country: USA

Education: BS in Electrical Engineering & Computer Science, University of California, Berkeley; PhD in Computer Science, Carnegie Mellon

Elizabeth Alice Austen

🎨 Landscape design 📷 Documentary photography

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🎨 Landscape design 📷 Documentary photography

Was with her life partner, Gertrude Tate, for 56 years
Her home on Staten Island, NY is a museum that fosters creative expression, explores personal identity, & inspires the public through interpretation of her photographs, life, & home; it is a nationally designated site of LGBTQ history
She was introduced to photography at age 10
Took over 8,000 pictures during her lifetime
She was 1 of the 1st female photographers to work outside of a studio
Was independently wealthy through birth until the crash of 1929
was the 1st woman on Staten Island to own an automobile
Mother's maiden name was Austen, was born Elizabeth Alice Munn but father abandoned the family when she was 3, preferred to use her mother's name; the museum at her Staten Island home houses approximately 7,500 of her pictures, approximately 500 of her pictures are available digitally for study through the Historical Society

Born: 1866

Country: USA

Education: unknown

Judith "Judy" Francisca Baca

🎨 Visual Artist

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🎨 Visual Artist

Her military father never knew of her existence
was not allowed to speak Spanish in elementary school
studied muralism at La Tallera in Cuernavaca, Mexico
1970 used rival gang members in her murals to bring community together
in her mural Raspados Mojados used a street vendor cart as a sculptural installation to address immigration issues and the misrepresentations of Mexicans living in the United States
included community in her artistic processes
believed the first step to world peace was imagining it
wanted to empower women of color and bring community together in Los Angeles
her public artworks focus on revealing and reconciling diverse peoples’ struggles for their rights and affirm the connections of each community to that place
taught Allied Art at her alma mater Bishop Alemany High School but was fired because she participated in public protests against the Vietman war
taught art at UC Irvine 1980-94 & UCLA 1980-2018

Born: 1946

Country: USA

Education: California State University Northridge MFA 1969 & MFA 1979

Florence Elizabeth Riefle Bahr

🎨 Artist

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🎨 Artist

she donated her painting, Homage to Martin Luther King, to the NAACP & it hangs in their headquarters, it depicts MLK giving his I Have a Dream speech
created illustrations for children's books
painted a mural for the Johns Hopkins Hospital's Harriet Lane Home for children under the WPA Program
began exhibiting her art in the 1930s
is the 1st woman artist recognized by Maryland's Women's Hall of Fame
often said she & her husband (another artist) would rather paint than eat
liked horseback riding, hiking & swimming
died in a house fire which also damaged many of her sketches & they were salvaged by staff & curators from the Maryland State Archives where they are now housed & can only be viewed after obtaining permission due to their damaged state
was arrested at a May Day anti-war demonstration at the Pentagon&sketched important events during the 20th century like the March on Washington, political trials,, demonstrations & marches along with portraits of people
donated over 300 sketchbooks of her works to the Maryland State Archives before her death
worked in multiple media & often incorporated natural elements she found like pebbles, shells & feathers in her work
did sketches, oil & watercolor paintings, lithographs, sculptures, book illustrations, collages & constructions of found materials
her art is held in private & public collections in Europe, Japan, & the US
collected antique dolls & did over 200 watercolor paintings of dolls
opened a museum in Ellicott City MD called Humpty Dumpty Museum of Dolls & Toys & was an antique dealer in the same city

Born: 1909

Country: USA

Education: Dickenson College 1 year 1927; Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA) Costume Design Diploma 1930, Fine Arts Diploma 1931, BFA Painting 1962, MFA Education & Printmaking 1967; Catonsville Community College classes in German & Biology 1959

Ruzena Bajcsy

🔍 Robotics 🤖 Artificial Intelligence

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Rachel Binah

🔍 Community ✊ Environmental Activist 🎨 Artist

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Louise Boyle

📷 Photography

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Anne Bradstreet

✍️ Writer of Puritan Poetry

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Cynthia Breazeal

🔍 Robotics 🤖 Artificial Intelligence

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Sarah Buckel

🎨 Graphic Arts

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Anne Chiang

🎬 Thin-film Transistors 🔬 Physical chemistry

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Mary Elizabeth Jane Colter

🔍 Architecture

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🔍 Architecture

was a perfectionist who advocated & defended her aesthetic vision in a male-dominated field
became fascinated by Native American art after receiving some drawings of Sioux art (some say she was given the drawings by a family friend while others note they were given to her by an uncle & were drawn by Sioux prisoners
she donated the drawings to the Little Bighorn Battlefield Monument in 1956 noting they were her most prized & cherished possession
graduated high school in 1883 at age 14
taught art, drafting & architecture for several years including 15 years at Mechanic Arts High School
began doing interior design for the Fred Harvey Company in 1902 on a freelance basis, becoming a full-time employee in 1910 & retiring from the company in 1948
was a chain smoker
donated her collection of Native American pottery & relics to the Mesa Verde National Park
4 of her Grand Canyon buildings are protected within the Mary Jane Colter Historic Landmark district
was also a book reviewer, editor for the Saint Paul Daily globe, a student of archaeology & history, a metal craft practitioner & expert on Native American art
some characteristics of her designs included tiny windows allowing shafts of light to accent red sandstone walls, low ceilings of saplings & twigs resting on peeled log beams, a hacienda enclosing an intimate courtyard, & rough boulder structures built into the earth as if a part of a natural rock formation
she employed indigenous builders, demanded the use of local materials whenever possible & attended to minute historical details she got from touring Native American ruins
some of the grand openings of her buildings were attended by Native Americans & had blessings by tribal elders & shamans
her El Navajo was demolished in 1957 & other buidings of hers fell into disrepair however there have been recent movements to restore them
hired Hopi artist Fred Kabotie to paint designs on the interior of Desert Watchtower

Born: 1869

Country: USA

Education: California School of Design (now San Francisco Art Institute 1886-1891

Margaret M. "Meg" Crane

🔍 Graphic 🎨 Product Design 💡 Inventor

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🔍 Graphic 🎨 Product Design 💡 Inventor

2004 was a juror in Martha Stewart's trial for lying to federal investigators during an insider trading investigation
was working on a new line of cosmetics packaging at Organon Pharmaceuticals (no longer in business) in west Orange NJ when she invented the home pregnancy test
saw test tubes in a lab at Organon & asked what they were & a scientist informed her they were pregnancy tests sent in by doctors & patients would get results in up to 2 weeks
used a paper clip holder, test tube, mirror, & dropper to create her prototype & presented the results to Organon executives who originally rejected her idea
"crashed" the meeting where the decision for the design of her idea of a home pregnancy test was being made after no consultation with her & placed her prototype among the others being considered, hers was eventually chosen because it looked the most "scientific" & trustworth
partnered with Ira /Sturtevant to do the advertising & marketing of her test named The Predictor & they remained partners in work & otherwise until his death in 2008
she & Ira went on to form their own marketing company they named Ponzi & Weill
although her name was on the patent, she was forced to sell her rights for $1 & never received it or any other money for her design because Organon sold the rights to 3 over-the-counter pharmaceutical companies
in 2015 a prototype of her Predictor & a 1970 packaged product version were acquired by the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History
her original tests gave results in approximately 2 hours, not the usual up to 2 weeks for tests submitted at a doctors office
PREDICTOR a play of her life & the creation of the hoe pregnancy test written by Jennifer Blackmer premiered in Nebraska in FEb. 2023
holds 1 patent

Born: 1941

Country: USA

Education: Unknown

Diane B. Croteau

🎨 Industrial Design

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Rebecca Davies

🎨 Glass Art 🔍 conservation

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🎨 Glass Art 🔍 conservation

bottle Underground collects bottles & jars from businesses & community members in Philadelphia & a potion of the glass is selected for Remark Glass that turns them into upcycled useable items for the home
the companies partner with companies like Rabbit Recycling (another Philadelphia female owned & run business) to recycle operational waste like bottle caps & use discarded cardboard & packaging from other local companies
they have diverted 311,639 ppounds of glass from landfills according to their website
Remark Glass is Philadelphia's 1st zero waste certified business
they are working with scientists from Penn State for material studies developing new products
some of their creations are available for purchase through the MoMA Design Store

Born: Unknown

Country: USA

Education: New Hampshire Institute of Art 2005; Glasgow School of Art Painting & Printmaking 2008; Smith college BA Studio Art-Painting & Printmaking 2009; University of the Arts MFA Fine Arts Printmaking 2011

Clara Pierce Wolcott Driscoll

🎨 Glass artist craftsman

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🎨 Glass artist craftsman

Was head of Tiffany Studios Women's Glass Cutting Dept known as the Tiffany Girls in NYC
Designed over 30 Tiffany Lamps including the Wisteria, Dragonfly, Peony, & the Daffodil (her 1st)
Hired by Louis Comfort Tiffany in 1888 & worked for him on & off for over 20 years; had to quit in 1889 when she married because Tiffany didn't allow married women to work for him; returned in 1892 after her husband died & remained until her marriage in 1909
Was one of the highest paid women of her time earning $10,000 annually
Books published in 2002 & 2006 brought to light the contributions of the Tiffany Girls whose work was previously attributed to Tiffany & his male employees
NY Historical Museum has 132 Tiffany Lamps & 63 are attributed to her

Born: 1861

Country: USA

Education: Western Reserve School of Design for Women (now Cleveland Institute of Art); Metropolitan Museum of Art School

Katherine Mary Dunham

🎨 Arts 🔍 Dance

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🎨 Arts 🔍 Dance

while a student at the University of Chicago, formed a dance group (Ballet Negre in 1930) that performed in concert at the Chicago World’s Fair in 1934 and with the Chicago Civic Opera company in 1935–36
was intent on tracing the roots of Black culture
sometimes wrote & published under the pseudonym Kaye Dunn
has been called the "matriarch and queen mother of black dance"
father was the descendant of slaves
mother died when she was 4 (1913) & she & her brother were sent to live with a paternal aunt, a custody battle with members of her mothers family resulted in unrest in the family, she & her brother were returned to their father after he remarried in 1915
became a mambo (Priestess) in the Vodun religion
Dunham technique introduces rhythm as the backbone of various widely known modern dance principles including contraction and release, groundedness, fall and recover, counterbalance, and many more including a strong emphasis on anatomical alignment, breath, and fluidity
refused to hold a show in one theater after finding out that the city's black residents had not been allowed to buy tickets for the performance
October 1944, after getting a rousing standing ovation in Louisville, Kentucky, she told the all-white audience that she and her company would not return because "your management will not allow people like you to sit next to people like us." (Wikipedia)
in 1950 after she & her troupe were not allowed to stay in a hotel in Sao Paulo Brazil she made sure the press was aware off the racial discrimination & the negative publicity led to the 1951 passage of the Afonso Arinos law that made racial discrimination in public places a felony in Brazil
credited with introducing international audiences to African aesthetics and establishing African dance as a true art form
was always a formidable advocate for racial equality, boycotting segregated venues in the United States and using her performances to highlight discrimination
maintained the Katherine dunham Dance Company for over 30 years & it was the only self-supported American Black dance troupe at the time
1921 a short story she wrote when 12, "Coming Back to Arizona" was published in volume 2 of The Brownies Handbook
played baseball, tennis, basketball & ran track, was VP of the French club & on the yearbook staff inhigh school
age 15 organized "The Blue Moon Cafe" a fundraiser for her church in Joliet, IL & performed in public for the 1st time
opened a dance school for young Black children while still in high school
never completed her coursework for her MA but did submit a thesis in 1938, leaving academia for the stage because she believed she could reach more people that way
toured on 6 countinents & to 38 with her dance company
1957 due to poor health spent 1 year basically in isolation in Kyoto Japan to write her memoirs
1964 was artist-in-residence at Southern Illinois University in Edwardsville Illinois
officially retired in 1967
1965 appointed by President Johnson as technical cultural advisor to Senegal & later established a home there
1949 she & 2nd husband John Pratt adopted a 14-month old daughter they named Marie-Christine in Paris
1977 the Katherine Dunham Museum & Children's Workshop opened in East Saint Lois
1993 the Government of Haiti awarded her citizenship

Born: 1909

Country: USA

Education: Joliet Junior College 1928; University of Chicago Ph.B Anthropology 1936

Vanessa Dunn

🎨 Makeup artist 💡 Inventor ✍️ Author

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Cheryl Dunye

🎨 Art 🎬 Film

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🎨 Art 🎬 Film

"Watermelon Woman" was briefly the source of controversy in 1997 when Michigan Republican senator Pete Hoekstra spoke out against the National Endowment for the Arts funding what he perceived as pornographic material because Dunye received an NEA grant of $31,500 to make her film
born in Liberia but raised in Philadelphia, PA
had a crush on a high school friend & when she came out to her as gay, the friend's mother volunteered to pay for a doctor so she could have someone to talk to about her problems, she portrayed the experience in her documentary, Janine, in 1990
was often the lead actress in her early works
a restored version of The Watermelon Woman was re-released in 2016 & is now part of the permanent cinema collection at MoMA in NYC

Born: 1966

Country: Liberia

Education: Temple University BA; Rutgers University Mason Gross School of the Arts MFA

Julie Spicer England

⚛️ Chemical Engineer 🎨 Artist

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Louise Frankfurt

🎨 Design 🔍 Philanthropy

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Elsie Frankfurt Pollock

🎨 Clothing Design

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🎨 Clothing Design

the new Page Boy skirt was constructed with a window over the area of the expanding abdomen which allowed the hemline to remain stable rather than to hike up as the woman's abdomen increased in size
a maternity-wear conglomerate acquired Page Boy in 1993 but decided to discontinue the brand
their first Page Boy store was within view of passing pregnant patients in Dallas’s Medical Arts Building
among the Page Boy customers were: Jackie Kennedy, Princess Grace, Lucille Ball, Judy Garland, Eva Marie Saint, & elizabeth Taylor
in the early 1960s se introduced yoga to the manufacturing plant, closing it down for 15 minutes every afternoon for relaxation
Hired mostly women for her company
1982 President Reagan appointed her to serve on the National Advisory council on continuing Education
was a staunch supporter of women's rights

Born: 1911

Country: USA

Education: Southern Methodist University BA Mathematics & Design

Elsa von Freytag-Loringhoven

🎨 Art 🤖 Painting

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Heather Friedli Ratzlaf

🎨 Art - Snow Sculpting

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Artemisia Gentileschi

🎨 Art 🤖 Painting

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Eugenia Almira Wheeler Goff

🎨 Cartography 🔍 Historian 📚 Educator

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Thelma Golden

🎨 Art Curator

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🎨 Art Curator

from 2017 to 2020, ArtReview chose her annually as one of the 10 most influential people in the contemporary art world
is the Director and Chief Curator of The Studio Museum in Harlem, New York City
1991 to 1998 was a curator at the Whitney Museum of American Art
was influenced by H. W. Janson's "History of Art"
was an apprentice at the Metropolitan Museum of Art while still in high school
her after-school activities included piano lessons, ice-skating, & gymnastics
started going to museums on her own when she was fifteen
her father often clipped stories about notable Black people for his son & daughter to read
the staff offices of the Studio Museum were on the second floor of the long building, and to save time when visiting her curators she navigated the corridors on a bicycle
Marcus Samuelsson has made her a partner in his Hav & Mar restaurant

Born: 1965

Country: USA

Education: Smith College BA Art History & African-American Studies 1987

Harmony Hammond

🎨 Art

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🎨 Art

taught at the University of Arizona, Tucson from 1989–2006
was a prominent figure in the founding of the feminist art movement in 1970s New York
was an instructor at the New York Feminist Art Institute
has been living in New Mexico since 1984
created sculptures in the early 1970s featuring swaths of fabric, a traditionally feminine material, as a primary material
her paintings show how they were made and are almost all abstract
in the 1990s primarily made mixed-media installations that incorporated a range of traditionally non-art materials (such as human hair and corrugated roofing) with traditional oil painting, and in the first decade of the 2000s, her focus was on making monochrome abstract paintings
has had more than 40 solo exhibitions internationally
The Harmony Hammond Papers were acquired by the Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles in 2016
is often labeled a queer abstractionist, and her work focuses primarily on questioning the signifiers of traditionally feminine materials and practices
practiced & taught the Japanese martial art of aikido