If They Should Ask
If They Should Ask is a temporary monument located in Rittenhouse Square that addresses the absence of monuments to women in the city of Philadelphia. The object is a collection of cast concrete pedestals sourced from existing monuments in Philadelphia and materialized at half-scale. Encircled with the names of women who contributed to civic and public life in Philadelphia from early European contact to the present day, If They Should Ask proposes that the persistent and aggressive exclusion of women from this form of public recognition perpetuates historical misunderstandings and reproduces inequality in the city’s economic, social, political and cultural spheres.
- Ahmeenah Young
- Alice Paul
- Anita Cornwell
- Barbara Gittings
- Billie Holiday
- Charlene Arcila
- Crystal Bird Fauset
- Gloria Casarez
- Happy Fernandez
- Jaci Adams
- Jarena Lee
- L.P.
- Notike
- Sarah Allen
- The transwomen at the 1965 sit-in at Dewey’s Cafe
- Ada Bello
- Alice (of Philadelphia)
- Anandabai Joshee
- Anne d’Harnoncourt
- Barbara Daniel-Cox
- Caroline R. Le Count
- Chicalicka Nanni Kettelev
- Clara Ward
- Cordelia A. Jennings
- Elizabeth Willing Powel
- Fanny Jackson Coppin
- Graceanna Lewis
- Gussie Clark
- Hester Burr
- Hetty Reckless
- Jan Welch
- Kathryne Dunbar
- Kay Lahusen
- Laetitia Rowley
- Lourdes Alvarez
- Margaretta Forten
- Mattie Humphrey
- Ona Judge Staines
- Rebecca J. Cole
- Rosemary Cubas
- Sadie T.M. Alexander
- Susannah Cork
- the woman whose name was written as Canatowa
- Violet Oakley
- Adele Goldstine
- Frances E.W. Harper
- Grace Bustill Douglass
- Hannah Freeman
- Harriet Forten Purvis
- Ora Washington
- Sarah Louise Forten
- Sarah Mapps Douglass
- the woman whose name was written as Canatowa
- women who joined Mutual Aid Societies
- Abigail Pankey
- Anne Brancato Wood
- Charlotte Forten Grimké
- Charyn Sutton
- Clara Baldwin
- Edna Thomas
- Elizabeth Taylor Greenfield
- Ethel Waters
- Frances Spence
- Kathleen McNulty Antonelli
- Lucretia Mott
- Marian Anderson
- Marie Bunel
- Mary Ann Shadd
- Mary Grew
- Maryln Meltzer
- Meta V.W. Fuller
- Nancy Spungen
- Nizah Morris
- Novella Williams
- Prathia Hall
- Rachel Harlow
- Rose Wylie
- Sister Falaka Fattah
- Susan La Flesche Picotte