Photo: Shira Gorelick
About me
Joan Roth is an internationally acclaimed photographer, photojournalist, ethnographer, and portraitist. For over five decades she used her camera to affect change for women who wouldn’t otherwise be seen. Her work includes homeless women in New York City, the U.S. Women’s Movement from the 1970s to today, and the diverse lives of Jewish women around the world.
She is most well known for her seminal work on Jews in Ethiopia and publication on Jewish Women: A World of Tradition and Change, a topic which she continues to work on to the present day. She has made a distinct impact on the lives of women cementing her place in a line of photographers who have used film to create art with a conscience.
Current Features
Documentary Film A Feminist Lens: The Art & Activism of Photographer Joan Roth - 2022
A Feminist Lens: The Art & Activism of Photographer Joan Roth is an intimate portrait of internationally acclaimed photographer Joan Roth.
The film focuses on five decades of Roth’s pioneering use of her camera as a tool to advocate for homeless women in New York City, document leaders in the U.S. Women’s Movement from the 1970s to today, and shine a light on the diverse lives of Jewish women around the world.
Holy Sparks: Celebrating 50 Years of Women in the Rabbinate - 2022
Celebrating 50 Years of Women in the Rabbinate with Hebrew Union College - Jewish Institute of Religion and The Braid.
Holy Sparks pairs leading artists with 24 woman rabbis to illuminate the creativity, commitment, and vision of women who were “firsts” in their time. Their challenges and contributions, struggles and successes, represent the achievements of all women rabbis since June 3, 1972, when Rabbi Sally Priesand was ordained by Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion.
Camera Ready, Lilith Magazine 2021
Joan Roth’s photography was featured in Lilith Magazine. The article shares Joan’s life story and highlights her pioneering work.
In Search of Jewish Women: My Travels Into Light, Nashim - A Journal of Jewish Women’s Studies and Gender studies, a publication of The Schechter Institute of Jewish Studies, Jerusalem, and the Hadassah Brandeis Institute.
JOAN ROTH EXHIBIT TO OPEN JERUSALEM BIENNIAL 2024
March 4, New York - Joan Roth’s photography will be featured at the upcoming Jerusalem Biennale. Her Exhibit on Jewish Women: A World of Tradition and Change will be the opening exhibit at the Jerusalem Biennale on March 11, 7:00 - 9:00 PM at the Black Box Gallery, 97 Jaffa Street. Her work is also featured in the Women’s Art Salon exhibit.
The opening program will include presentations from Rami Ozeri, Judith Margolius, Joan Roth, along with other music and other festivities.
Gloria Steinem
Writer, Political Activist,
and Feminist Organizer
"Joan Roth has looked at the Jewish world as if women mattered and therefore as if everyone mattered. Across all boundaries of geography and language, there is not only a common world of belief, but a common world of women. We see into its intimacy through her eyes."
Alice Shalvi
President Emerita of the
Israeli Women's Network
“[Joan Roth] has the gift for seeing the significant moment, the meaningful gesture, and the fleeting look, which convey an in-depth character, a lifetime of experience, and an entire culture. [Her] gaze is a female gaze and, in the capacity to penetrate below the surface to the essence of women's lives, it is a feminist gaze, which does not objectify, but rather empathizes, sympathizes, and identifies with the subjects of her work.”
Ed Geffner
Former Executive Director of the Manhattan Project
