About Us ...
Why this festival? Why now? We can't answer these questions without first asking: What is labor? What are the arts? Our answers to these questions reflect discussions we've had ever since we began planning the first festival in 1997.
First of all, "labor" is broadly the group or class of people who work and do not own the means of making what they produce; those who have worked but have been downsized out of a job; and those who have no hope of ever holding a job that will provide them the opportunity for material and cultural sustenance.
This group of people works full time, part-time and no time; they have permanent jobs, temporary jobs, pieces of jobs. They get paid good wages, bad wages, welfare, no fare. They belong to the AFL, the AARP, the Welfare Rights Union, and mostly, to no union at all.
Labor, by this definition, probably means 90% of the people in this country. It certainly means more than 90% of all artists, because the advent of art as a saleable item has meant at least these two things: First, the artist has become a special group of "labor" that earns its living by selling its ability to make art (commercial art, music, writing); Second, those who cannot make their living at art are not considered to be artists, not considered creative, and considered unable to produce art.
For us, however, art is not the special province of immensely talented people. Art emanates from the experience and action of each individual, taking different and surprising turns and forms. Turning art into a thing whose sole object is the procurement of the means of subsistence is part of a process that began with the introduction of commodities in general, and even turned human labor into an item to be bought and sold.
The consequence of this development is the wide disparity in wealth and poverty that we see today -- a disparity that is growing. This festival celebrates the joys and struggles of working-class people. It seeks through art to popularize what our history books erase and to stimulate each of us to think of the ways we, as creative people, can use our imaginative powers.
A new movement is developing that encompasses 90% of the people, spanning those that are one paycheck away from being in the streets to those already living there.
We hope you enjoy the variety of art you will find in the festival, and that it will stimulate your creative enthusiasm. We hope it will provoke you. We hope that you will find in the festival's panel discussions that artists are serious about probing how the new community and working conditions we face demand new forms or content of creative work. And we hope you will join with us in the effort to broaden and expand this dialogue to include as many of the 90% of the people that we can reach.