Independent Workers Movement ~April 18

I love my neighborhood, I can always depend on it to provide someway for me to avoid labor studies readings. Today there was an Independent Workers Movement rally and march. The demands of the marchers were some of my favorite issues:

• End the theft of our salaries by employers
• End the racist raids against immigrants
• Citizenship or legalization for all
• Stop Police harassment of: day laborers, all street vendors and of youth
• For the unity of families and for our children
• End homophobia

We marched from Broadway and 69th St to Junction and Roosevelt, with a short rally at 83rd and Roosevelt, and a longer rally at Junction and Roosevelt.

Some of the groups participating were:

Queens Day Laborers; Philippine Forum; Bayan NYC; Sisa Pakari Labor Center ; Queens Street Vendors Union; People’s Organization for Progress NYC Chapter; International Socialist Organization; Million Worker March Movement; LGBT Equality Coalition of Queens; Latino Students of NYU; May 1st Coalition; Pakistan-USA Freedom Forum

October 1st 5-7pm

Union Square South

Join a Breadline for the Unemployed, Underemployed
and Low-Wage Workers of our
Great City of New York!

In these tough economic times, we will revisit the breadline as a tool for subsidizing low wage employment that pervades our service economy.

Our Human Resource Department will be available to help you access your benefit of a free peanut butter and jelly sandwich.

Rev. Billy and the Church of Life after Shopping will also be present to bless the line and those souls who need a raise or employment.

For those who like to give back a little, call 347-256-4429 or email commonthreadsart@gmail.com to find out how you can volunteer at the breadline.


After you get your bread, you can join the party at the Art in Odd Places Festival opening at TheaterLab 137 14th Street btw 6th & 7th Aves http://www.artinoddplaces.org/


PB&J for a Retail Economy is produced by Alicia Canary, Martin Munoz and Leah Danger. This performance piece is a part of Retailing 14th Street, a collaboration of the Common Threads Art Collective and artist Stephanie Rothenberg with the support of the Retail Action Project.

Retailing 14th Street intends to bring awareness to the experiences of 14th Street retail workers during the run of the Art In Odd Places Festival in October.

Check out http://retailing14thstreet.blogspot.com/ for the calendar of more Retailing 14th Street public interventions.

One of a series of meditations on the phrase "I will know"

It is important to realize the power my purchases wield. I need to acknowledge my responsibilities as a consumer. I will know how the workers at the companies my purchases feed are treated. I will know the working conditions at the plant that manufactures my shoes. I will know how the sales clerks are treated at the stores where I buy my clothes. I will know how the animals are housed on the farm from where I buy my meat. I will know how my vegetables are grown. I will know my farmer. I will know.

December 10, 2008

Temporary Print assemblage
Today as an idea generating exercise I made temporary assemblages with with some paper bits I had left over from print and collage projects.

Large Assemblage
All of my previous assemblages could be described as nano sculptures, none of them being more then an inch or two in any direction. But this lovely bit of infrastructure was found on an walk in Manhattan on West Ave and seemed to fit my theme, even at a gargantuan size of 9 inches long and 6 inches wide at the base.

Found infrastuture object, fabric, thread, map bits, and found words.

My New Button Battalion

Chess pieces
planning strategic actions
paths to fulfill ideals

Buttons hold close/d our outerwear
covering our soft, warm , mushy, vulnerable parts

Holiday Show

December 6 - 24, 2008
Holiday Show

A sale and exhibition of student work. All work is for sale.

The Art Students League of New York | 215 West 57th Street, New York

December is assemblage month

Assemblage-12021-002

Assemblage-120202-001

Assemblage-120206-001


Assemblage-120202-001


Assemblage-120204-001

Monday Pieces

This is another in the thread collage series. The base is an etching I did of threads last year. Today I used water color to highlight some shapes, added bits from a dictionary and a final layer of thin paper on which I had sewn red thread.

Then two more flat collages.

Common Threads:Art in spite of Retail

Installation views of my assemblage photos at the common threads show.

Untitled Assemblage 5

Untitled Assemblage 2

Untitled Assemblage 4

Untitled Assemblage 3

The opening was a blast, poets, bands, performance, and lots of friends.

The photos will be posted soon on my ETSY store with a link listed here.

YEAH!!!OBAMA, OBAMA!!!

OKAY, not nearly as liberal as I would like
but I am happy that a big enough portion of the country
voted a little more to the left then in previous years.

These are some collages I finished up today, found objects, thread, bits of found words
that felt as if they should be in a flat format.

What shall tomorrow bring? more threads to unravel and more thoughts to be freed.

Today I am content, relaxed and still hopeful...except for that dark Prop 8 cloud.

Moon-Rings

Bird on a wire

The assemblage photos are growing
these objects seem to really like going out into the world
playing around the village
stopping here and there to pose

Meditations:void

Works in progress
Meditations on the void

Earlier I had made 40 round prints, trying to capture the concept of what the void would be. As in I feel as though I am falling into the void.

Pongo

Pongo Rhodes, 03/28/93-10/21/08

the most amazing tree climbing dog ever

Thread Collage

If the threads of life start to unravel
take a chance and let them flow free
unraveling in a sexy, sensuous, colorful flow
and see what life they make

Fiber Project

Four weeks of knitting
a huge roll of hemp
a shawl/rug
is birthed

Architectual comparison to discourse

Architectural
Comparison
to discourse
of mutual concern
to confer with an enemy
an exchange of prisoners