The artists who recorded the dignity and struggle of
California's turbulent 20th century labor movement will be presented in AT WORK:
THE ART OF CALIFORNIA LABOR, opening Labor Day at the California Historical
Society. The tribute to California's rich labor history includes the exhibition,
a Labor Day Festival at Yerba Buena Gardens, and publication of a book
featuring art from the exhibition.
The first overview of labor themes in California art over the last century,
AT WORK includes work by photographers Dorothea Lange, Tina Modotti, Pirkle
Jones, and Otto Hagel, painters Hung Liu and Diego Rivera, printmakers Rupert
Garcia and Emmy Lou Packard, and other pivotal artists of the century. Mark Dean
Johnson, director of the SFSU Fine Arts Gallery, curated the exhibition.
The CHS features historic pieces from 1900-1970, including the Chicano arts
movement. The SFSU Fine Arts Gallery, 1600 Holloway Ave. at 19th Avenue,
displays contemporary and conceptual labor artists Hung Liu, Larry Sultan, Allan
Sekula, Sebastião Salgado, and others. Visit californiahistoricalsociety.com
for details on both venues and related programming.
The AT WORK exhibition kicks off with the SF Labor Day Festival at Yerba
Buena Gardens, a free family event, Monday, September 1. The Festival offers live
music and children’s activities 11 AM - 5 PM, at Yerba Buena Gardens (Mission
Street between 3rd/4th Streets), in downtown San Francisco. Visit
www.sflabordayfestival.com or call 415 543-1718 for details.
Publication of At Work: The Art of California Labor (CHS Press & Heyday
Books) is set for September 2003. Edited by Mark Dean Johnson, the book offers 108
color plates, a foreword by historian Gray Brechin, and an afterword by
writer/activist Tillie Olsen.
The AT WORK exhibition is presented by the CHS, SFSU, California Labor
Federation AFL-CIO, Heyday Books, and SF Labor Council.
IMAGE:
Emmy Lou Packard
Carpenter, ca. 1950
woodcut
Related Links:
