rewrite this title Portraits of women who ‘shine a light’: from an ‘analog’ astronaut to a watermelon farmer

A 19-year-old mechanic in Nigeria who maintains the water supply, a ground-breaking jazz guitarist from Sudan, deep-sea diving women in their 60s from South Korea, a watermelon vendor in Indonesia who at 82 is her family’s main bread winner.

They are among the subjects in the photography exhibition, “Iconic Women: From Everyday Life to Global Heroes,” that opens on March 8, in honor of International Women’s Day, at the Muhammad Ali Center in Louisville, Kentucky, and will run through January 19. The photos represent the winners of the Center’s eleventh annual “Shining a Light” document photo contest, chosen from 472 submissions from photographers from 65 countries.

The goal each year is to “shine a light on the issue of gender equality,” said Amelia McGrath, the Center’s archivist and manager of collections. It also honors the fact that Muhammad Ali — the professional boxer, social activist and philanthropist for whom the center is named — was named a United Nations Global Messenger of Peace in 1986.

Past exhibits have focused on such subjects as voting rights and women in various careers. This year’s exhibit highlights “iconic women,” with photos demonstrating how women of different ages around the world have inspired, contributed to, empowered and built up their communities, their families and the lives of others.

Here is a selection of portraits featured in the exhibition with descriptions of their subjects drawn from information provided by the photographers.

A watermelon farmer who lifts up her family

Now 82, Mbok Sutinah — Mbok is the Javanese nickname for an older woman — has been selling watermelon to support her family since her husband’s death in 1987. The watermelon comes from her late husband’s watermelon farm, which Mbok has continued to cultivate with the help of her children and grandchildren, selling the harvested fruit to a distribution company in Malang, East Java. Mbok, her two children and three grandchildren all live in the same house in the small Indonesian village of Kampung Nuasantra, located near Blitar East Java.

She explores places on earth that simulate outer space

Michaela Musilová is a Slovak astrobiologist and analog astronaut — a scientist who simulates space issues on earth. She has overseen more than 30 simulated missions to the moon and to Mars as the director of HI-SEAS (the Hawai’i Space Exploration Analog and Simulation). She is seen here leading her team on a mission into the darkness of a volcanic lava tube in Hawaii in search of information about how life can exist in such an inhospitable place — and how that might relate to living in space. She is currently president of the nonprofit XtremeFrontiers, which she founded, where she continues to conduct research and lead expeditions in cooperation with NASA, among other institutions worldwide. Interested since childhood in becoming an astronaut, she is an advocate for science education and is seen as the “Bill Nye” of Slovakia.

A ground-breaking guitarist

Born in Omdurman, Sudan in 1943, Zakia Abul Gassim Abu Bakr began her musical career in the 1960s, becoming one of the country’s first professional female guitarists. She explained in an interview once that “it was the Sudanese dress that attracted them the most… I feel that the audiences were amazed and happy to see a woman in a Sudanese jazz band.” She has toured all over the world and now leads the all-female band, Sawa Sawa.

Diving for a livelihood

Soon-ja Hong, 69, is one of the female divers of Jeju Island, South Korea. The women are known as the Haenyeo — “women of the sea.” Starting in the 17th century,  the island’s women took over the breadwinning task of deep-diving to the ocean floor. There they gather mollusks, conch, seaweed and other seafood, providing food and income for their families and their communities. The custom was for them to start training from an early age. In today’s industrialized agricultural world, though, the number of Haenyeo has steadily declined from tens of thousands to just a few thousand, and most of those who remain are in their 60s or older.  The women of the sea has been added to the UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage list.

Sweeping away plastic problems

Lucia Abigan, a street sweeper in Marikina City, Philippines, embodies how ordinary women can lead extraordinary efforts in protecting the environment, says photographer Danilo O. Victoriano. Beyond her daily duties, Abigan volunteers at the local Material Recovery Facility, where she not only cleans and sorts plastic waste but also educates the next generation about sustainability and responsibility.  She leads interactive workshops about how discarded plastic bottles can be transformed into useful items like planters, decor or even eco-bricks for construction. 

An advocate inspired by her own divorce

For Sari Pollen of Bali, Indonesia, the price of gaining a divorce from a strained marriage was losing custody of her young daughter. She also learned, first from her own experience and then from listening to the stories of others, that divorced women often suffered from being ostracized in Balinese society. After studying to become a teacher, she helped found a school for children with special needs. She then decided to create a safe haven for vulnerable women, the PKP Community Center, which provides job training and emotional support for women and families in need.

A nomad’s traditional life

Manana leads a nomadic life in a remote mountainous region of Georgia with her husband and two children. Her days are spent tending to livestock, moving between seasonal pastures, performing physical labor and maintaining a traditional way of life now under threat of disappearing in our modern society. She is a quiet hero in sustaining her family’s cultural heritage, says the photographer. 

A mechanic who keeps water flowing

Rasheedat Umar, 19, is one of the few female mechanics in Nigeria’s Sokoto State. She got her training in a program that collaborates with UNICEF and has taught over 100 mechanics to sustain water facilities, which often suffer failures due to a lack of maintenance. Umar’s newly gained expertise has been critical to keep maintain the community’s water facilities, which provide clean and safe water to over 20,000 local families. Umar is not just helping to provide water, “she is breaking barriers and inspiring change for women in Northern Nigeria,” says photographer Sope Adela.

Firefighters who break down barriers 

The image is part of a series detailing the work of female firefighters in Abuja, the capital of Africa’s most populous nation, Nigeria. They endure months of intensive training to qualify for their jobs — and have broken gender barriers.

Diane Cole writes for many publications, including The Wall Street Journal and The Washington Post. She is the author of the memoir After Great Pain: A New Life Emerges. Her website is DianeJoyceCole.com.