Mrs. Emmeline Pankhurst
Photograph
Alice Boughton
American, 1865–1943
Mrs. Emmeline Pankhurst
ca. 1909
Platinum print
Image: 8 1/8 × 6 1/8 in. (20.6 × 15.6 cm)
Paper: 8 7/16 × 6 7/16 in. (21.5 × 16.4 cm)
Purchase
1973.0023.0007
Inscriptions inscribed in ink on verso: Mrs. Pankhurst
Label TextEmmeline Pankhurst was known as “England’s most famous suffragette.” An activist from the age of fourteen, she founded two notable women’s rights groups. The peaceful protests she organized were often met with violence from opposition members. In response, Pankhurst and many of her colleagues became more aggressive, earning a reputation for acts of vandalism, hunger strikes, and arson. Pankhurst traveled to the United States for speaking tours in 1909, 1911, and 1913; it is possible that it was during one of these visits that she sat for this portrait by Alice Boughton. Breaking with gender norms of the time by studying photography, Boughton established one of the premier portrait studios in New York and became a fellow of the Photo-Secession, a group advocating for the medium as an art form.
—Label text, History of Photography [Rotation 15]
—Label text, History of Photography [Rotation 15]