Maude Barlow

For more than three decades Maude Barlow has worked to safeguard the fundamental human rights to fresh, free water. Her recent book, Blue Covenant: The Global Water Crisis & the Coming Battle for the Right to Water, highlights the dangers inherent in the commodification of water and the need for all of us to recognize and save the vital supplies of fresh water for all across the planet. 

Because of her global work to preserve access to water, Maude Barlow was nominated for the 2005 "1000 Women for Peace" Nobel Peace Prize. She is also the 2005 recipient of the Right Livelihood Award given by the Swedish Parliament, as well as the 2008 Canadian Environmental Award. She is co-founder of the Blue Planet Project which works internationally for water rights and served as Senior Advisor on water to the United Nations in 2008 and 2009. Barlow is the recipient many honorary doctorates as well as additional awards, including the 2009 Earth Day Canada Outstanding Environmental Achievement Award, the 2009 Planet in FOCUS Eco Hero Award, and the 2011 Earth Care Award, the highest international honor of the Sierra Club (U.S.). 

She urges all of us to become "keepers of the fresh water systems" in our localities and to take back control of this most vital, life sustaining resource. 

Amy Goodman

Amy Goodman is an award-winning internationally known journalist and host of Democracy Now, a daily radio and television program broadcast on more than 800 stations. Upon accepting the Right Livelihood Award she described her work and responsibility to give voice to those who have been forgotten, forsaken, beaten down by the powerful." To that end she has brought the stories of hundreds who work for peace, justice and the environment to her audiences. 

Included in her interviews are the stories of the women whose portraits join hers in this exhibition. Goodman has interviewed and brought us the inspiring stories of Helen Caldicott, Cindy Sheehan, Malalai Joya, Wangari Maathai, Vandana Shiva, Maude Barlow and many more. She has been arrested multiple times and has risked her life to tell their stories so that truth can survive.

She was first journalist to receive the Right Livelihood Award, also referred to as "The Alternate Nobel Prize", and is the author of three New York Times bestsellers: The Exception to the Rulers, Static, and Standing Up to the Madness. 

Dr. Vandana Shiva

Dr. Shiva has become a world-renowned environmental leader who articulates the inherent connection between the environment, agriculture, spirituality, and the rights of women and the poor. Shiva has served as an adviser to governments in India and abroad as well as non governmental organizations, including the International Forum on Globalization, the Women's Environment & Development Organization and the Third World Network. 

In 1982 she established the Research Foundation on Science, Technology and Ecology to study the ecological value of traditional farming and to fight destructive development projects in India. Shiva's work includes the promotion of biodiversity, use of native seeds, water use and misuse, and the impact of globalization and industrial agriculture on the poor of the world. She was awarded the 1993 Right Livelihood Award (the Alternative Nobel Peace Prize) for her work with national and international environmental organizations and in 2003 Time Magazine identified Dr. Shiva as an environmental hero. Dr. Shiva has authored over 500 papers in leading scientific and technical journals and 20 books including "Water Wars". 

Wangari Maathai

Wangari Maathai (1940-2011) was recognized around the world for her work for environmental 

conservation, democracy, and human rights. The first woman in East and Central Africa to earn a doctorate, she became chairperson of the Department of Veterinary Anatomy at the University of Nairobi in 1976. Her international work for the environment and democracy began modestly when she became active in the National Council of Women in Kenya to promote a program of community-based tree planting. As the grassroots organization developed to focus on poverty reduction and environmental conservation, it became known as the Green Belt Movement and expanded in time to become the Pan African Green Belt Network. Despite intense political pressure from interests opposed to her work, threats of violence and imprisonment, and personal loss, Maathai remained committed to the forests of Kenya and social justice for its people. The 2004 recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize, she addressed the United Nations on behalf of women and the important connection between environmental health and social justice. She wrote Unbowed, The Challenge for Africa and Replenishing the Earth. 

At the 2012 African Union Summit, the Heads of State of Africa voted to change the name of Africa Environment Day, March 3rd, to 'Wangari Maathai Day". 

Dr. Helen Caldicott

Dr. Helen Caldicott has worked for forty years to educate the world about the medical threats of the nuclear age and to articulate the ways in which we must change our behavior if we are to avoid environmental destruction. While living in the United States from 1977 to 1986, she co-founded Physicians for Social Responsibility, an organization of over 23,000 doctors committed to educating their colleagues about the dangers of nuclear power, nuclear weapons and the global risks of nuclear war. 

Nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize by Linus Pauling, Caldicott has received the Peace Medal Award from the United Nations Association of Australia and the Integrity Award from the John-Roger Foundation, which she shares with Bishop Desmond Tutu. She is also the recipient of the Gandhi Peace Prize, The Lannan Foundations 2003 Prize for Cultural Freedom and 21 honorary doctorate degrees. The author of nine books and numerous publications, and the subject of several films, the Smithsonian Institution named her as one of the most influential women of the 20th century. 

Dr. Sylvia Earle

National Geographic Society Explorer in Residence Dr. Sylvia A. Earle, called Her Deepness by the New Yorker and the New York Times, Living Legend by the Library of Congress, and first Hero for the Planet by Time Magazine, is an oceanographer, explorer, author and lecturer. 

She has led more than 100 expeditions and logged more than 7,000 hours underwater including leading the first team of women aquanauts during the Tektite Project in 1970, participating in ten saturation dives, most recently in July 2012, and setting a record for solo diving in 1,000 meters depth. Her research concerns marine ecosystems with special reference to exploration, conservation and the development and use of new technologies for access and effective operations in the deep sea and other remote environments. 

Her special focus is on developing a global network of areas in the Ocean, "Hope Spots," to safeguard the living systems that provide the underpinnings of global processes, from maintaining biodiversity and yielding basic life support services to providing stability and resiliency in response to accelerating climate change. 

In 2009, Dr. Earle won the Ted Prize.

Her Ted Talk Wish:

"I wish you would use all means at your disposal-films, expeditions, the web, new submarines to create a campaign to ignite public support for a global network of marine protected areas; Hope Spots large enough to save and restore the blue heart of the planet."