Hannah Höch was an important member of the Berlin Dada movement, a pioneer of photomontage and a feminist icon. Höch was born in 1889, in Gotha, Germany. She was forced to leave school at 15 to take care of a sister, and was not able to resume her studies until she was 22 when she …
Patti Smith is an American singer-songwriter, poet and visual artist. She became a high influential part of the New York City punk rock scene after the release of her 1975 album Horses. Smith was a tomboy as a child, experiencing gender confusion because she did not fit in with the social expectations of femininity. She …
Frida Kahlo was a Mexican painter and later a feminist icon. She is best known for her self-portraits. Kahlo was three when the Mexican Revolution began in 1910 and witnessed violent armed struggles in the streets of Mexico City and frequent gunfire. Her mother would occasionally feed the revolutionaries. Kahlo contracted polio when she was …
Anne-Marie “Marie” Tussaud was a French artist who became known for her wax sculptures. She is the founder of Madame Tussauds, the wax museum in London. Tussaud was raised by her mother Anne in Bern, Switzerland. She worked as a housekeeper for Dr. Philippe Curtius, whom Tussaud referred to as ‘Uncle’. Curtius was a physician …
Kathleen Hanna is an American musician, feminist activist, and punk zine writer. She is best known for being one of the founding members of the Riot Grrrl band Bikini Kill. Hanna was born in 1968 in Portland, Oregon. She became a feminist at a young age, inspired by Betty Friedan’s The Feminine Mystique, the feminist …
Maud Wagner was a circus performer and the first known female tattoo artist in the United States. Wagner was an aerialist and contortionist who worked traveling circuses when she met the tattoo artist Gus Wagner at the Louisiana Purchase Exposition in 1904. Wagner wanted to learn to tattoo and exchanged a date with Gus for …