Labor of Fire is an exhibition about the politics of work and economics in the art world. The project began as a critical reflection on institutional practices of artist engagement and broadened into an inquiry into the social and private spheres of artistic labor in neoliberal societies. Artists (together with a number of workers that rapidly grew between 1950 and 2010) have responded to the transition to a post-industrial service economy with increasing professionalization and academic institutionalization. They have become progressively more interested in theoretical discourse and in addressing, intellectually and emotionally, some of the most pressing cultural and political issues of our society. Yet artistic work is often economically precarious, exploited, and devalued—conditions with deep-running implications for various aspects of equity, including diversity and representation within the art world.

The exhibition puts labor in front of the audience to dispel the illusion that the gallery space can exclude or suspend the tension between art and equity. The artists in the show turn their own labor into a subject of inquiry as well as its means. By analyzing the creative process and including its least glamorous sides, they reframe discounted forms of labor, such as maintenance and childcare, as foundational. By tracing within the art object the stories and processes of its own production, they recast the work of art as a fossil of labor itself. Together, these works challenge institutions and art administrators to think about what fair support for artists is.

Labor of Fire also seeks to highlight the interdependence between intimate, private experiences of laboring and collectively shared ones. Meditation, manual and administrative work, maintenance, care, and craft coexist here as equally important and complementary practices of worldmaking—of building and tending to our social and physical habitats.

The title Labor of Fire is borrowed from Bruno Gullì’s 2005 book on the essential nature of labor. Gullì presents labor as a constitutive aspect of human existence. It is fundamentally thoughtful and directed action, he argues, a creative force that shapes our material and social environment. The economic paradigm of our society, capitalism, may categorize labor as productive or unproductive and value or reward it accordingly. But these categories are only the product of norms and conventions, geographic and historical circumstances. Labor that is unconcerned with ideas of productivity is “labor of fire.” 

Contemporary artists live out the paradoxical struggle to practice this labor, moved by a creative, not an economic imperative. Many have opposed the objectification and commodification of their work, developing practices that challenge social expectations and norms of taste. Beginning with the Dadaists and their critique of art itself, this trend continued to evolve well into the 21st century, seeing the proliferation of a wide range of movements and expressive forms as varied as performances, happenings, environmental, social, and research-based practices. Most contemporary institutions accept—in fact, celebrate—the claim for artistic labor’s intellectual autonomy even as they try to capture and institutionalize ex-post some of the most anti-institutionalist practices, such as art strikes. A good example is the exhibition Messing with MoMA (2015), organized by the Library of the Museum of Modern Art in New York to showcase a history of controversies the organization was embroiled in, including, among others, the Art Workers Coalition’s 1969 Artists strike and Occupy MoMA (2012).

What is more, though, many institutional actors have come to use the idea of autonomy as a smokescreen that hides the power dynamics pushing artists into a condition of economic precariousness. Society construes the making of art as labor only ambiguously: At once personal vocation and social good, artistic labor is often exploited behind a rhetoric of entrepreneurialism. Capital and institutions absorb the fruits of the artist’s work, and the struggle for self-subsistence is the artist’s private matter.

The research underpinning Labor of Fire shows that this inquiry has a long history, dating back to at least the 1960s, with the formation of the Art Workers Coalition (1969) and continuing more recently with the work of organizations such as W.A.G.E — Working Artists in the Greater Economy (founded in 2008) — and the collective BFAMFAPHD (formed in 2012). Yet, institutions often still struggle to acknowledge and address the political economy of their operations. The development of AI technology to generate content through the massive harvesting of original work, to which it gives no credit, let alone remuneration, is a clear indicator that the tendency to separate human labor and experience from the work of art is alive and well. But this tendency continues to exist also in low-tech and institutionally dressed-up versions. Organizations (and their administrators) that believe seriously in the value of art must also seriously value the work that goes into making it.

This exhibition would not have been possible without the labor of many. My gratitude goes to the artists: janet e. dandridge, Julia Kwon, Fanni Somogyi, and Isabella Whitfield. Their labor—visible and invisible—is the why and the how of this project. I wish to thank The DC Arts Center team for their work in helping me bring this show to fruition and for being open to this reflection — holding not just physical space but also space for dialogue on equitable institutional practices. Last but not least, I am grateful for the support of Mentor Curator Jeffry Cudlin, who showed me through active advocacy that curating goes beyond planning exhibitions and displaying art, and fellow Apprentice Curator FAITH, who was throughout this journey a thoughtful sounding board and caring companion.