Center - Review Santa Fe 2021

Nina Hamberg

Half Moon Bay, CA

"Image: Row of Men / Title: First Feminist Protest At Phone Company – San Francisco, December 1969 / Caption: Phone company managers encounter a surprise on their way back from lunch / Info: It was illegal to discriminate on the basis of gender, but that didn’t stop Pacific Telephone Company, one of California’s largest employers, from systematically shunting women into low-paying clerical work and declaring all other jobs off limits. This series captures the first time feminists picketed the phone company demanding equal access to jobs and equal pay. There was a variety of reactions to the demonstration that day. But most people who worked at the phone company - from operators to installers to management - watched, transfixed, calculating what this protest might mean for them."
Project: Change Has A Female Face: Images from the 1970's Women's Movement

"Image: Woman Leaning Against Wall / Title: First Feminist Protest At Phone Company – San Francisco, December 1969 / Caption: A clerk holds a feminist flier about salary discrepancies for men and women at the phone company; she is one of only a handful of employees who takes it. / Info: It was illegal to discriminate on the basis of gender, but that didn’t stop Pacific Telephone Company, one of California’s largest employers, from systematically shunting women into low-paying clerical work and declaring all other jobs off limits. This series captures the first time feminists picketed the phone company demanding equal access to jobs and equal pay. There was a variety of reactions to the demonstration that day. But most people who worked at the phone company - from operators to installers to management - watched, transfixed, calculating what this protest might mean for them."
Project: Change Has A Female Face: Images from the 1970's Women's Movement

"Image: “We Are Proud” Picket Sign / Title: First Feminist Protest At Phone Company – San Francisco, December 1969 / Caption: One of the few protest signs that doesn’t deal with economic issues / Info: It was illegal to discriminate on the basis of gender, but that didn’t stop Pacific Telephone Company, one of California’s largest employers, from systematically shunting women into low-paying clerical work and declaring all other jobs off limits. This series captures the first time feminists picketed the phone company demanding equal access to jobs and equal pay. There was a variety of reactions to the demonstration that day. But most people who worked at the phone company - from operators to installers to management - watched, transfixed, calculating what this protest might mean for them."
Project: Change Has A Female Face: Images from the 1970's Women's Movement

"Image: Women in Crowd / Title: Largest West Coast Feminist Rally in a Generation – San Francisco, August 1970 / Caption: Feminists gather in an overflow crowd / Info: On the 50th anniversary of women winning the vote, protests were planned across the country, calling for an end to sexism. In San Francisco, a three-hour rally was planned, but no one knew how many people would show up. By noon, more than 2,000 people had clustered in the city’s central square, making the San Francisco feminist rally one of the largest in the country. The turnout was much bigger than those of us in the Women’s Movement had expected, and the energy, more exuberant. This was a show of strength. A celebration."
Project: Change Has A Female Face: Images from the 1970's Women's Movement

"Image: Reporters in Row / Title: Largest West Coast Feminist Rally in a Generation – San Francisco, August 1970 / Caption: Television crews, journalists and rally supporters record the event / Info: On the 50th anniversary of women winning the vote, protests were planned across the country, calling for an end to sexism. In San Francisco, a three-hour rally was planned, but no one knew how many people would show up. By noon, more than 2,000 people had clustered in the city’s central square, making the San Francisco feminist rally one of the largest in the country. The turnout was much bigger than those of us in the Women’s Movement had expected, and the energy, more exuberant. This was a show of strength. A celebration."
Project: Change Has A Female Face: Images from the 1970's Women's Movement

Artist's Statement

Nina Hamberg

35mm black-and-white negative film. Exhibition prints: 11”x 14”

My goal is to show an intimate view of the 1970’s feminist movement in a way that hasn’t been seen before and that speaks to the present moment.

When I shot this series starting in 1969, I was an undergraduate photography major at San Francisco State University and an activist in the emerging women’s movement. I set out to capture the energy of the women fighting sexism, as well as the reactions of men and women watching the early feminist demonstrations, many of whom were hearing about gender inequality for the first time. I also brought my camera to private feminist gatherings so I could show that world from the inside.

After graduation, when I had to earn a living, I boxed up all my work. In the decades that followed, I lugged those cartons with me wherever I went. The negatives are survivors. They were in the last cartons waiting to be unloaded from my car when I moved into a new home. They were still in my backseat two nights later when the house burned down.

I went to graduate school and built a career in communications, using my photography skills. All along, I’d planned on resurrecting these images, publishing and exhibiting them as soon as I had the time. But I never did. Something always got in the way. Until now. My entire women’s movement project spans six events: three public demonstrations (two of which are shown here) and three smaller gatherings. This year is the 50th anniversary of many of the events in the photographs. It’s also the first time in decades that feminism is again on the national stage, making it important to take stock of where we’ve been.

Sisterhood was a word that united feminists in the 1970’s. These images provide a new view of what that sisterhood looked like.

Nina Hamberg

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Artist's Statement

Nina Hamberg