AMELIE CHABANNES

The Project

n her paintings, Chabannes explore various representations of identity within philosophy, psychology, and art history. Following my project "Double Portraits and the Fourth Hand" (2012–2016), which examined the intersection of gender in collaborative artist couples, I was commissioned to draw and paint all original portraits and artwork for UNLADYLIKE2020, a timeless and resource-rich repository of U.S. women’s histories from the early years of feminism. From 2016 to 2021, Chabannes worked as the main artist and the artistic director for the animated documentary film series UNLADYLIKE2020 SEASON 1 , which premiered on PBS’s flagship biography program American Masters with 26 digital shorts and a one-hour television broadcast about diverse and little-known historical American heroines, and the women who now follow in their footsteps, in honor of the centennial of women's suffrage. These rebellious, persistent, and daring — unladylike! — women overcame severe sexism and racism to excel in science, medicine, politics, business, journalism, sports, aviation, and the arts at the turn of the 20th century — including the first woman to lead scientific expeditions in the Arctic, join the National Academy of Engineering, found a hospital on an American Indian reservation, serve in the U.S. Congress, become a bank president, swim across the English Channel, earn an international pilot’s license, sing opera on the main stage at Carnegie Hall, or direct a feature-length movie. Presenting this history in a bold new way, UNLADYLIKE2020 has reached over 6 million viewers to date. Major funding for the series was provided by the National Endowment for the Humanities, the National Endowment for the Arts, and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, along with 18 additional funders including private foundations and state humanities councils. The series was nominated for an NAACP Image Award, a Primetime Emmy Award as part of American Masters’ 2020 season, and was a 2021 Webby Award honoree. The series also received a Silver Award at the 2021 Telly Awards, a 2021 Imagen Award for Best Short Film, and the My Hero Project’s 2020 Women Transforming Media Award.

Narrated by Emmy, Golden Globe and Screen Actors Guild Award-winner Julianna Margulies (ER, The Good Wife, Billions) and Screen Actors Guild and Critics Choice Award-winner Lorraine Toussaint (Selma, Orange is the New Black, The Glorias), the series of 10-to-12 minute animated documentary shorts is available via PBS’s flagship biography series American Masters. American Masters also premiered a one-hour television special on PBS July 10, 2020, American Masters – UNLADYLIKE2020: The Changemakers, illuminating the stories of 5 pioneers in politics and civil rights.

The Mission

The mission of UNLADYLIKE2020 is to inspire, engage and educate audiences in an underrepresented narrative: how women, and in particular women of color, changed America 100+ years ago — paving the way for future generations to do many ‘unladylike’ things. Our goals are to:

• Contribute inspiring, online content to audiences across the globe in challenging times;

• Expand how U.S. history is taught and understood across the country, and highlight the role of women in shaping American history;

• Present an inclusive perspective of women’s history by telling the stories of unsung women from diverse professional, geographical, racial-ethnic, and economic backgrounds, sexual orientations and gender identities;

• Honor the 2020 centennial of women’s suffrage;

• And provide a historical lens on the global movement for gender equality, and spark dialogue about the roles, expectations, limitations, and opportunities for women and girls today.

• Because the women we feature were behaving in ways that placed them outside the mainstream of expected behaviors for ‘ladies’ at the time, the title for the series is derived from the negative perceptions which their contemporaries typically held of them. As journalist and political activist Louise Bryant (1885-1936) proclaimed in 1919, “I do not want to be treated like a lady, but I want to be treated as a human being,” and as historian Laurel Thatcher Ulrich echoed in the 1970s, “well-behaved women seldom make history.”

  At the turn of the 20th century, women in the United States did not have the full right to vote, and had only recently won the right to own property or get divorced. They faced limited career and educational choices, were often expected to provide all of the childcare, and in some parts of the country were even arrested for wearing pants in public. But conditions were ripe for newfound freedoms. It was the so-called Progressive Era, and the decades from the 1890s through the 1920s were a time of rapid urbanization, industrialization, technological advancement, and reform that resulted in significant changes to the country’s social, political, cultural, and economic institutions. Women broke into new professions, stepped into leadership roles, and fought for suffrage and an end to race discrimination. While these trailblazers lived more than a century ago, we hope that their stories of overcoming unimaginable societal forces and conditions will inspire all audiences — especially the girls and women, and boys and men, of today.