In response to the increasing prosecution of rappers in Tunisia as part of a broader crackdown on free expression by the country’s Islamist government, rappers in the country have formed a union.
unions
How Are Artists Getting Paid?
How are artists who have been systematically denied fair wages and access to basic services like healthcare and unemployment protections gaining access to those things today?
The Bubble and the Rat: A Visit to Frieze New York
Visiting Frieze New York on Randall’s Island is like being sucked into a black hole. You get on a ferry (or a bus, or a bike), enter a giant, spacious tent, and then time stops. Or it disappears. Or it slips away. Next thing you know, you stumble out dehydrated and drunk off your speakeasy cocktail and notice the sun starting to sink in the sky.
What’s Going on at the SF Fine Arts Museums?
For more than six months, the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco have been in the news nonstop. Robert Flynn Johnson, the museums’ curator emeritus, summed it up pretty well when he called the museums’ situation “a state of Orwellian dysfunction.” And that’s just the news that’s been reported.
Labor Issues in Spotlight as Frieze NY Prepares for May Art Fair [UPDATE]
New York City councilmembers and labor leaders, united under the auspices of Teamsters Joint Council 16, gave a press conference on the steps of City Hall yesterday, again blasting the use of non-union labor for Frieze Art Fair on Randall’s Island.
British Museum Maintenance Workers Strike Against Privatization
Roughly 50 maintenance workers and cleaners at the British Museum staged a brief strike this past Monday, the AFP reports, protesting the museum’s plans to privatize maintenance work starting next April. The workers are represented by the Public and Commercial Services (PCS) union and Unite, and both groups have expressed concern that their members’ pay and conditions will be affected by the plan to contract the work out to a single private company.
Teamsters Press Release Announcing the Sotheby’s Settlement
The following is the full text of the press release by the Teamsters union regarding the settlement between Sotheby’s auction house and the 42 union art handlers.
Sotheby’s Art Handlers Resolve Contract Dispute: IT’S OVER!
Teamsters Local 814, which represents the 42 workers of the Sotheby’s art handlers’ union, has settled their 10-month dispute with the Sotheby’s auction house.
Fight Returns to New York as Locked Out Art Handlers Continue Protest Against Sotheby’s
Last week, Sotheby’s art handlers took their fight to London but today they’re back in New York and manning the picket lines on York Avenue.
#OccupyWallStreet Invades Sotheby’s Auction in Solidarity with Locked-Out Art Handlers
Occupy Wall Street and Sotheby’s art handlers have joined forces under the banner of fighting for worker’s rights and protesting corporate greed. Yesterday, members of Occupy Wall Street disrupted a Sotheby’s art auction to show their solidarity with the union art handlers of Teamsters Local 814 who have been locked out since early August.
FROM THE PROTEST: Sotheby’s Anti-Union Games, Dupes Art Handlers
The Upper East Side is alive today with shouts of “UNION POWER” as Sotheby’s art handlers took to the streets to protest a new contract agreement that would drastically jeopardize their benefits.