The artist Andrea Bowers this week sent this letter to the organizers of the Frieze Art Fair, which opens today on Randall’s Island in New York City.
Bowers’ great cardboard monuments to American workers are on view at the Fair, in the booths of the Susan Velmeitter and Kaufmann Repetto Galleries, and are featured in the Little Star Weekly Gallery this week.
Her works on display focus on labor issues and are accompanied by a letter calling on the Fair’s organizers to negotiate with the union. She has attempted personally to broker negotiations between the union and the organizers. Other recent projects by Bowers have addressed immigration, women’s rights, and environmental depredation. She is represented by Susan Velmeitter: Los Angeles Projects.
Said an activist involved in the protest: “It has been amazing to work with Andrea and the activists at Occupy Arts and Labor. It seems like in this dispute labor, artists, and activists have organized around a common concern organically—no formal meetings, no to-do lists, just talking and working and being respectful of one another. It is typically very difficult getting so many groups to work cooperatively. I am starting to think that maybe it is because the leadership is all women . . .”
For news about the state of negotiations, visit:
Arts and Labor: A Working Group from Occupy Wall Street
“City Hall Don’t Frieze Out New Yorkers”: Elected Officials and Labor Leaders Call Upon City Hall to Change Parks Permitting Because of Rogue Art Show” (Teamster.org, April 17, 2013)
Union Members Protest Frieze Labor Policy, Andrea Bowers Joins the Fray, by Zoë Lescaze (GalleristNY, May 9, 2013)
Teamsters Shift Course, Frieze Sponsor Deutsche Bank Now a Target, by Hrag Vartanian (Hyperallergic, May 8, 2013)
Twitter: #FriezeRatFair, @OWSArtsandLabor
