For 1 year spanning 1972 to 1973, Melissa Shook took a daily photo of herself, “to prove that I exist.” The photos capture Shook in varying positions and activities, from clothed to unclothed, some with a friend and some with her daughter. An exercise centered around explorations into self-identity, these photographs are at the forefront of the conceptual ideas that fueled feminist artists in the late 1960s and early 1970s.

American photographer Melissa Shook (1939-2020) studied at Bard College and the Art Students League of New York. Shook taught at Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Creative Photo Lab in 1974, and at the University of Massachusetts Boston from 1975 to 2005. Her subjects included her daughter, the important series of daily self-portraits, a shelter for homeless men and women, and a wheelchair basketball team.