Tea & Talk Series: The Life & Photography of Alice Austen

Staten Island, 1895: 29-year-old Alice Austen bicycles to the Manhatten ferry, carrying 50 pounds of photographic equipment, to take groundbreaking images on the streets of New York City. Austen documented immigrant arrivals at Ellis Island, the construction of the Statue of Liberty; paper boys, street vendors, postmen, and much more of the rich, everyday life of the period. She was the first to work outside the studio and was a trailblazer in other aspects of her life: unmarried and living with her partner, she supported the movement encouraging and instructing women on how to ride a bicycle, which Susan B. Anthony declared, had: ” done more to emancipate women than anything in the world.” Victoria Munro, Director of the Alice Austen House, will explore Austen’s extraordinary life, and share the current activities at her Staten Island home.