Page 25 - Studio International - December 1973

look at art, both the art that is there today fear of the recommendations being made public grievances with treatment of artists by
and the art being made by artists today'.. While art would deter acceptance of the proposal. On museums, grievances with which many museum
is zealously preserved for future generations 3o October the Museum rejected fact-finding'.. workers are sympathetic. It is time museum
as one of the few human enterprises worthy of Two days later, The New York Times workers and artists took advantage of the fact
such preservation, the people who make and published an editorial stating: that museums cannot exist without them and
care for art are treated by society as if their '... Submitting all unresolved issues to that the grip museum trustees and their
functions are trivial and expendable'.. Every determination by impartial experts makes much faithful administrators have on museums is
shout from PASTA/MOMA's picket line is more sense in such situations than waiting for not unbreakable'..
serving notice on this double standard'.. For one side or the other to crack under the strain of With this kind of organization and union
perhaps the first time the hypocrisy of many a prolonged strike'.. consolidation, museums could not remain
museum-goers and of museum administrators '... We see even less (merit) in the present open during strikes'.. Further, a small group of
is being made public'.. One can no longer posture refusal of the Museum of Modern Art supervisory personnel could ensure the safety of
a reverence for art and museums while management to effect an immediate return to works of art for only a limited time under such
displaying contempt for museum workers and normal operations through acceptance of its circumstances'.. And it has become clear that
artists'.. As Lucy R'.. Lippard said in a letter union's proposal for non-binding fact-finding'..' management can no longer plead with strikers
published in The New York Times: In addition, US Senator Jacob Javits called that works of art are endangered, while at the
`The "lower" curators, librarians, editors and the Museum's rejection of fact-finding 'highly same time exploiting those workers at the
other exploited workers are the heart of the regrettable' and City Councilman Carter bargaining table'.. Appeals to professional ethics
museum — the real energy that keeps it in touch Burden also urged the Museum to accept the fall on deaf ears when those professionals have
with real life'.. Are they to be the victims, like union's proposal'.. Nevertheless, a mediation been treated for years like 'hired help''..
artists themselves, of a society which considers session called by the Museum on 5 November Yet the ultimate goal is not a 'super-strike''..
art, scholarly work, dedication to aesthetic and produced no progress'.. On that same day the If museum workers are paid a living wage and
social standards of so little value that they don't New York City firemen struck'.. A state of treated like professionals, and if museum
have to be paid for ?' emergency was immediately declared and the workers and artists are truly let in on the
One answer to Lippard's question came on firemen's strike ended after only five hours with decision-making process in museums, then
25 October, Solidarity Day, when workers from both sides agreeing to binding arbitration'.. museums can at last step into the twentieth
other New York museums — the Whitney, As PASTA/MOMA's strike entered its fifth century as democratized institutions whose
Guggenheim, Metropolitan and others — week it was clear that the various specific issues practices are as 'humane' as the artistic
joined PASTA/MOMA's picket line and added which precipitated the action had been subsumed enterprise they claim to represent'.. Such
their voices to the growing chorus of museum under the larger issue of whether management institutions need not be struck'..
professionals'.. Clearly, PASTA/MOMA was could continue its arrogant policy of union- Meanwhile, as this report is being completed
striking not only for itself, but for the entire busting, a policy most recently reflected in its the strike goes on'.. Far from weakening, the
museum profession, a profession which will no rejection of non-binding fact-finding'.. At a strikers are showing increasing militancy'.. In
longer accept the role of 'victim'..' Four days later time when even the President of the United spite of the passage of five weeks without pay,
representatives from the Whitney, Guggenheim, States faces possible impeachment for his the picket line gets stronger. Strike benefits
Brooklyn and Contemporary Crafts museums, as abuses of power and his repeated attempts:to are minimal ($15 per week for full-time
well as from PASTA/MOMA, formed the deny information to the public, the congress, picketers) and the weather is becoming
Museum Workers Association of New York and the courts, can the Museum continue colder'.. The Museum calls the police more often
City'.. The purpose was to lay the foundation for indefinitely its own abuse of power and its as verbal harassment of the public escalates'..
the organization of professionals at the other secrecy ? Events on the evening of 7 November
New York museums and for the eventual When firemen strike, the populace is in peril'.. dramatized the seriousness of this strike and its
establishment of a city-wide union of museum When automobile workers strike, the economy profound implications'.. Hollis Frampton, a
workers'.. Considering the legal certification of is in peril'.. Since the museum workers do not film-maker, photographer and critic, was
professional unions at the Minneapolis Art currently hold such leverage, they must seek out scheduled to deliver a lecture on photography
Institute and the San Francisco Museum of and develop their own appropriate forms of at the Museum'.. Frampton cancelled his
Art during the past two years, the outline of a power'.. First, there is the possibility of the appearance in support of the strikers'.. A massive
national organization begins to emerge'.. organization of all workers within an individual and vocal picket line of museum workers and
On 29 October the union, convinced of the museum — guards, professionals, electricians, artists stood outside the Museum'.. Well-known
reasonableness of its demands and still hopeful carpenters, etc'.. — into one in-house union'.. photographer Walker Evans, who agreed at the
of obtaining a settlement which would be fair This would replace the current diffusion of last minute to substitute for Frampton, was
to both sides, sent the following telegram to power resulting from a multiplicity of in-house publicly humiliated with choruses of 'Scab !'
Richard Oldenburg: unions, each with a separate contract as he approached the Museum'.. The police were
`On behalf of The Professional and expiration date and each bound by 'no-strike' called'.. Some of the picketing artists peacefully
Administrative Staff Association we offer to clauses which prohibit them from honouring entered the Museum and milled around in the
return to work immediately upon your other union picket lines'.. If this cannot be lobby, only to be thrown out by the police at the
agreement to submit all outstanding issues accomplished immediately, priority can be Museum's request'.. One of the artists, Jon
between us to a fact-finding panel to be given to the elimination of 'no-strike' clauses Hendricks, was almost arrested, and with
selected by mutual agreement and empowered from future contracts'.. Second, there is the militancy on the rise the possibility of future
to make non-binding recommendations possibility of the eventual organization of arrests of museum workers and artists seemed
to the parties'..' museum workers city- or nation-wide, a likely'.. The outcome of the strike remains to be
The Museum had little to lose by accepting possibility which becomes more real every day'.. determined, but running through some minds
this offer'.. The recommendations of such a Finally, there is the possibility of establishing was the thought that when a museum locks out
panel would be non-binding. And, once the some machinery for ties between museum its artists and its workers, it might as well lock
staff returned to work it would be unlikely workers and artists, a liaison which could be its doors, for it has desecrated the works of art
that it could be mobilized for a follow-up strike mutually beneficial'.. Artists in the past have inside and forfeited its moral right to display
whatever the Museum's response to the panel's asked for representation on museum boards, them'.. q
findings'.. It appeared that only the Museum's and many artists have expressed well-founded MARK SEGAL
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