Labor/Art

I always find it fun to equate parts of life to equations. It is not a meaningful exercise until it gets to the point of thoughtful interaction and abstract connection of ideas.

There is a very common theme I noticed, in Grad School, in which artist from the rust belt, we all want to talk about labor. Everyone there has some connection to it, industry is literally what drove many of these places to exist. So everyone there knows someone who works on roads or bridges, smashes some kind of rock, or pulls something out of the earth. They know teachers and nurses, all kinds of people who help.

So labor is kind of applied to all of these positions, and more, retail work is work and it hurts. Now there’s even a new breed, which is the work from home warriors. Folks who can code up a storm or run a few businesses from their offices in their houses. And another word comes up, grind. You’re grinding out cash.

The broad term artist could include plenty of these ideas. The friction that I see, it tends to come up around experience and perspective. There are two levels of connection which is practical and theoretical. I’m a painter, I’ve built canvases from scratch, stretched raw cotton over cheap pine and sealed it all with the painters primer known as gesso. So when I talk to a carpenter, I know a few things to check and consider, but I don’t live the life. I study it, I use some of it, but I don’t live it. There is never a day in my artistic life where I have to manipulate lumber or metal or face the public, if I don’t want to. What I have to do is maintain a life around me so I can do the thing I have to do, which is paint.

I have to change my own water heater, I can’t afford a plumber. I have to patch the roof, it’s leaking into the walls. I have to mow my own grass and I have to work at least 50 hours a week. I have to help other people, so they can help me when I need it. I have to show up, I have to be there for myself and other people.

I think a lot of that is what’s gone into my most recent works.

Here’s an in progress painting of me and the dudes in progress on making a floor.