
It has been a long time since we’ve seen undistorted portraits of working women in print media. Since the start of the era of consumerism and social media, what we are exposed to is either airbrushed celebrities or the poverty on the other side of the social ladder.
We should move back to showing respect for and to working women! Working class people are the ones who keep this world spinning!
femLENS is starting the “Women at Work” campaign to celebrate women’s labour – manual, intellectual and domestic. Our goal is to create an alternative to mainstream stock images of Women at Work.
Send in your existing portraits of working women or create a new series to contribute to our CreativeCommons licensed photo archive. Images will be available under the “CC BY-NC-ND: (Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial NoDerivatives)” license. This license allows reusers to copy and distribute the material in any medium or format in an unmodified form only, for noncommercial purposes only, and only so long as attribution is given to the creator.
The archive will make these photographs available to anyone with a non-commercial mission – educational, anthropological, scientific perspective, as well as for article s about working women, with full creator attribution.
The images will also be presented in a zine towards the end of 2021.

Instructions: If you would like to contribute your photographs of working women, please follow these steps:
1. A selection of 1 to 10 relevant images of women at work (please send with WeTransfer).
2. Make sure to include your name, the name of the woman in the photo, the job/role she is doing, city/country and date, as well as your approval for the photos to be licensed under the “CC BY-NC-ND: (Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial NoDerivatives)” license. You can also write an artist statement and a short biography if you like.
3. If you like, consider interviewing a woman, using the questions below. Ask other questions that you feel are appropriate as long as you record the question and the answer. Record your notes on a separate sheet of paper or on your phone.
- Name of interviewer:
- Name of interviewee:
- Date of interview:
- Place of interview:
- Any info relevant to the interview (age, location, industry)
- What was your very first job?
- What do you call yourself now? What is your job position now? Why did you start this job?
- Tell me a bit about how you became a …?
- What educational background or professional training did you have before starting your first job? Did you receive on-the-job training?
- Have you ever been a part of mentoring program?
- Do you know if your work is protected (pensions, benefits, state recognition)?
- What is the best/most rewarding part of your job?
- How do you balance your job with your family life, volunteer work, hobbies and other interests? Did that balance change over time? Do you have any mother and child facilities at work?
- Is there anything you wish you had done differently in your career? Are there any job opportunities or careers you would like to explore?
- What’s the most important piece of advice you’d give to a woman thinking of starting a career in …?
- Do you think there’s a stereotype attached to female workers in this field?
- In your opinion, is it important that more women take up … in the near future?
- What do you think is the biggest issue today facing women of your age?
- How important is it for women to lift each other up and what does that mean to you?
4. Send all the above files to info(at)femlens.com