Dear MASS MoCA,
I have been trying to write this blog entry for two months, struggling to find the right words to say it. It's simple, really: I love you. We are like, totally soul mates. It's ok, I know you have lots of other visitor-soulmates; in fact, I think an open relationship is the best kind of relationship a museum and its visitors can have.
I've known it for a long time. But just when I thought you were practically perfect, this BLOWS MY MIND. And my little heart. A new exhibition: The Workers, May 29, 2011-March 25, 2012.
Ok, from MASS MoCA:
We all know what Rosie the Riveter looked like, and what she stood for. [Oh boy, do we!]
Ford-era production line labor -- and the rise of powerful unions -- left us indelible portraits of work in mid 20th century America. [Don't make me swoon!]...
But what does work look like today in a global economy marked by outsourcing, rapid migration, disruptive economies, and a state of labor that seems fractured, precarious, and almost invisible? With video, sculpture, photography, and performance art from 25 artists, this exhibition examines the way labor is represented today (and how some contemporary workers choose to represent themselves. [Emphasis mine.]
The timing, and the place, could not be more fitting: Once the site of a bustling factory itself -- whose closure in the face of intense international competition left nearly a third of it's community out of work -- MASS MoCA is perhaps uniquely positioned to present this timely show... [Yes! YES!]
And as if all that wasn't enough:
In conjunction with The Workers MASS MoCA curator Susan Cross has invited Bureau for Open Culture -- a nomadic contemporary arts program directed by curator and art historian James Voorhies -- to inhabit one of the museum's buildings for the first four months of the exhibition. Set within a previously unused industrial building on the grounds of MASS MoCA, Bureau for Open Culture presents I Am Searching for Field Character, an exhibition series of public conversations, performances, installations, and workshops with a slew of visiting artists, writers, designers, and thinkers, a well as a beer garden which operates every Thursday and Friday night between May 26 and September 30.
Let me get this straight: CONTEMPORARY ART AND LABOR, HISTORIC INDUSTRIAL SPACES, NOMADIC ARTS PROGRAMS, SUPER-RELEVANCE, AND A...BEER GARDEN??? And then there's the BOC project publication: Bureau for Open Culture: On Symptoms of Cultural Industry. [Preview: WHY is it we are so moved by decaying environments? What propels the creative and cultural, the spontaneous and unpredictable in response to the dilapidation, vacancy, poverty and hardship of crumbling capital? Oh. My.]
I could not possibly make up anything dreamier. Ok, so I'll try not to get too excited before I've experienced it all.
No, I think I'll just got with it.
WHEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!
