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The National Portrait Gallery acknowledges the Traditional Custodians of Country throughout Australia and recognises the continuing connection to lands, waters and communities. We pay our respect to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures and to Elders both past and present.

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander viewers are warned that this website contains images of deceased persons.

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Portrait of Anne Summers

1974
Carol Jerrems

gelatin silver photograph on paper (sheet: 17.2 cm x 25.0 cm, image: 16.0 cm x 24.0 cm)

Anne Summers AO (b. 1945) is the author of the bestselling Damned Whores and God's Police (1975), a landmark feminist text. Summers became involved in women's rights while studying politics at the University of Adelaide, and was one of five founders of the Women's Liberation Movement group in Adelaide in 1969. After moving to Sydney, she was part of a cooperative that established Australia's first refuge for domestic violence victims. As a journalist for The National Times she investigated NSW prisons, which led to a royal commission and a Walkley Award for Summers. Appointed head of the Office for the Status of Women in 1983, Summers was instrumental in the passage of the Anti-Discrimination Act; in the 1990s she worked as an adviser to Prime Minister Paul Keating. In New York from 1986 to 1992, Summers was editor-in-chief of Ms magazine; and later edited the Good Weekend. Author of eight books, her memoir Unfettered and Alive was published in 2018 and she is a columnist for the Sydney Morning Herald.

These portraits by Carol Jerrems were taken in January 1974, while Summers was working intensely on Damned Whores and God's Police in her Birchgrove flat. Summers has said the portraits capture her anxiety about this project as well as the steeliness that enabled her to complete it.

Purchased 2012
© Ken Jerrems and the Estate of Lance Jerrems

The National Portrait Gallery respects the artistic and intellectual property rights of others. Works of art from the collection are reproduced as per the Australian Copyright Act 1968 (Cth). The use of images of works from the collection may be restricted under the Act. Requests for a reproduction of a work of art can be made through a Reproduction request. For further information please contact NPG Copyright.

Artist and subject

Carol Jerrems (age 25 in 1974)

Anne Summers AO (age 29 in 1974)

Subject professions

Activism

Media and communications

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The National Portrait Gallery acknowledges the Traditional Custodians of Country throughout Australia and recognises the continuing connection to lands, waters and communities. We pay our respect to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures and to Elders past and present. We respectfully advise that this site includes works by, images of, names of, voices of and references to deceased people.

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The National Portrait Gallery respects the artistic and intellectual property rights of others. The use of images of works of art reproduced on this website and all other content may be restricted under the Australian Copyright Act 1968 (Cth). Requests for a reproduction of a work of art or other content can be made through a Reproduction request. For further information please contact NPG Copyright.

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