Re: Working Labor

In Fall 2018, inaugural Faculty Research Fellows at SAIC’s Institute for Curatorial Research and Practice, Daniel Eisenberg and Ellen Rothenberg, began a multi-year research project regarding the subject of labor. The project sought to rethink and reimagine representations of the changing nature of work, as well as reflect on the dislocating effects of globalization and technology, which have created deeply unstable economic conditions and polarized our political moment. The research project’s inaugural public event was a symposium titled Re: Working Labor, which featured presentations related to labor by an array of prominent historians, artists, cultural critics, and curators from a variety of disciplinary backgrounds. Additionally, Daniel and Ellen organized a gathering of working groups made up of various scholars, artists, writers, and theorist, who spent a day in exchange and dialogue regarding labor and labor-based art practices. In Fall 2019, Ellen and Daniel’s research culminated in the curation of a group exhibition at SAIC’s Sullivan Galleries featuring newly commissioned works by Mierle Laderman Ukeles and Ibrahim Mahama, as well as an installation of Antje Ehmann and Harun Farocki’s collaborative project, Labour in a Single Shot, among other works and projects. This presentation features Daniel and Ellen in conversation regarding the Re: Working Labor project, its various components, its events, how it unfolded, and how it explored different notions of labor and creativity.