Freda Leinwand Collection

This collection consists of photographs, posters, books, and t-shirts of photographer, Freda Leinwand. Many of the photographs depict the Women's Liberation Movement and Women's Literary Salons that took place in New York City in the 1970s and 1980s.

The Women's Literary Salon was founded in 1975 by Marilyn Coffey, Erica Duncan, Karen Malpede, and Gloria Orenstein with the purpose of presenting readings, art, and performances created by women to an audience of women scholars, artists, and writers. In addition to the aforementioned Salon founders, many notable figures are depicted in Leinwand's photographs. These women include Judy Chicago, Barbara Deming, Audre Lorde, Meridel Le Sueur, Adrienne Rich, Susan Schwalb, Merlin Stone, Carole Rosenthal, Alida Walsh, Nina Yankowitz, and Susan Yankowitz.

The remainder of the photography and poster collection is comprised of photographs Leinwand took for textbooks and images of her travels to Puerto Rico, Mexico, Ireland, California, and the Arizona desert. In her textbook photography, Leinwand expressed a particular interest in depicting women at work, specifically those employed in jobs commonly understood at the time to be "non-traditional" women's work. In most cases the photographs are undated and unlabeled.



Freda Leinwand's book collection includes many seminal feminist texts, photography manuals, textbooks, and art books of photography. In most cases, the textbooks are those that include Leinwand's images. Many of the photography books are compilations of women photographers, which also includes a number of issues of Aperture and Photography Annual magazines.



The t-shirt collection contains ten shirts printed with feminist slogans. There are images of women wearing similar shirts included in the collection.



The complete collection of photographs and Leinwand's personal papers are held at the Radcliffe Institute’s Schlesinger Library in Cambridge, MA.