Essential Workers is a 34 x 39-foot-wide immersive surface sewn out of used blue collar overalls, jackets, jumpsuits, and pants in response to temporary rules that affected how and when people worked as the Covid-19 pandemic got underway. Used utilitarian clothing intended to protect the body is literally unmade, carefully taken apart at the seam and resewn to other garments. This produces a sea of workers’ bodies that join together to flow off the edge of the picture plane. In a social and political context characterized by changing norms of employment (the rise of outsourcing, temping, and gig workers, the disappearance of long-term contracts and government sector jobs, etc…) and the specific realities of labor revealed by the pandemic, the art asks us to re-imagine the past, present, and future of work.
Essential Workers was featured in the group show Rechantier at the Galerie Giardi in Saint-Étienne, France and in the exhibition Work Zones at Goodyear Arts in Charlotte, NC and in the 2025 Artfields Competition in Lake City, SC.