Just completed: a 12″ x 14″ mosaic portrait of Alice Paul. She was imprisoned and force-fed as a suffragist activist, and she co-authored the Equal Rights Amendment, and re-wrote it in 1943. The 19th Amendment was ratified in 1920, allowing women the right to vote. The Equal Rights Amendment remains a proposal, as it was never ratified.
This portrait is made of salvaged stained glass in tones chosen to imitate a vintage photograph. The portrait itself is raised above the level of the background, which is tempered-glass over a collage of images from the Suffrage Movement. On one hand, this could symbolize a sort of “glass ceiling” concept, as these efforts made it possible for so many women to enter modern politics. And from a different perspective, it could represent a broken system that would suppress the rights of half of its citizens to begin with, where one group works so hard to maintain power over others, and where we are still fighting for equality a century later.
Glass mosaic of Alice Paul, suffragist. 1885-1977
