Joan E. Biren

Education Biren attended Mount Holyoke College in South Hadley, Massachusetts, where she received her B.A. in political science in 1966. She received an M.A. in communications at American University in 1974.

Photography It was in the collective that Biren began developing her skills in photography. In the 1970s, Biren toured the United States, photographing lesbians at women's events ranging from the Michigan Womyn's Music Festival, anti-Ku Klux Klan demonstrations, writing workshops, sporting events, lesbian-separatist communities, and pride parades. She has also photographed notable lesbians such as Kitty Tsui, Sarah Schulman, Shay Youngblood, Barbara Smith, Cherríe Moraga, and Hattie Gossett, as well as events like the Gay Games, the Seneca Women's Encampment for a Future of Peace and Justice, and Christopher Street Liberation Day.

Biren's first book, Eye to Eye: Portraits of Lesbians (1979), was considered a revolutionary work for its era. The book showcased Biren's collection of photographs that she took of lesbians from different backgrounds and ages in the United States living their daily lives. Photographs included lesbians in their homes embracing each other, raising a family together, and showing love. Alongside the photographs, Biren included their names and personal stories of their lives. Biren's vision for her book was to change the way society viewed lesbians and to allow lesbians to see themselves represented. The publication of her book allowed her to travel to bookstores and universities that requested Biren give presentations about her book and describe her writing and filming process as a lesbian feminist photographer. The book was republished in 2021 by Anthology Editions with additional essays from artist Tee Corinne, soccer player Lori Lindsey, and photographer Lola Flash.

After the publication of Eye to Eye in 1979, Biren developed a slideshow, "Lesbian Images in Photography, 1850 to the Present", also known as "The Dyke Show," intending to publicize the book, and toured the country presenting it to women-only audiences. The presentation also includes contemporary images from the gay liberation movement, erotica, and peer lesbian photographers such as Tee Corrine, Cathy Cade, Diana Davies, and Kay Tobin. Several images from the Dyke Show were sourced from Library of Congress collections, which Biren photographed surreptitiously in the bathrooms; the slideshow included sections on patterns and indicators of lesbianism in photography, hoping to increase visibility. For many years, Biren traveled the country presenting her multi-projector slideshows and running photography workshops.

Her mentors included Audre Lorde and Barbara Deming. In her photography, Biren tried to break away from the traditional power structures associated with photography. She preferred to use the term "muse" rather than "subject." She would also try to interact with her "muses" on equal terms, in what she has described as "lesbian semiotics," a concept further explored in her 1983 article "Lesbian Photography–Seeing Through Our Own Eyes" in Studies in Visual Communication. Removing the Barriers; Women Organize!; Solidarity, Not Charity; Lesbian Physicians on Practice, Patients and Power; and For Love and For Life: The 1987 March on Washington for Lesbian and Gay Rights. The one-hour film received wide acclaim and was voted Best Video at the Reel Affirmations film festival. To produce this piece, Biren set up a live six-camera switch feed that simultaneously broadcast footage on jumbo screens located in the National Mall and around the world.

Later career and recognition In 1995, Biren became an associate of the Women's Institute for Freedom of the Press, an American non-profit publishing organization that works to increase communication between women and connect the public with women-based media.

In 1997, George Washington University mounted a retrospective exhibit of Biren's work, Queerly Visible: 1971–1991, which later toured the country.

Biren received the Alice Austen Award in 2018 for the Advancement of Photography. In 2017, she received an honorary doctorate from her alma mater, Mount Holyoke College.

Biren's papers and visual materials are permanently archived at the Sophia Smith Collection at Smith College.