Reborn in the City of Light

In 1935, Berenice Abbott was photographing scenes for her monumental collection Changing New York when a male bureaucrat at the Federal Art Project admonished her. “Nice girls” didn’t venture into rough neighborhoods like New York City’s Skid Row, he said.

“Buddy, I’m not a nice girl,” the 37-year-old Abbott snapped back. “I’m a photographer … I go anywhere.”