May-Day

‘A Tale of Two Cities’ (1859) by Charles Dickens begins: “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness…” This eloquent opening sentence could apply perfectly to the ‘Tale of One City (Melbourne)’ during the month of May.

On March 23, the Victorian Government reported 0 active cases of COVID-19 in Victoria. Prior to mid-May, the state had experienced no community transmissions for around three months. Life had resumed a large degree of pre-COVID activity, and the vaccine rollout was proceeding – albeit slowly and cautiously due to the overhyping of the extremely rare clotting/bleeding complication from the Astrazeneca vaccine. The anxiety about the Astrazeneca issues allowed me to move up the vaccination queue earlier than I had anticipated. I am pleased that I was ‘jabbed’ in early May.

The relaxed air, and relative freedom, in Melbourne permitted a re-engagement with the city’s cultural events which were to be the substance of blogposts during the month. However, ‘a life crowded with incident’ sabotaged the best intentions and ‘beguidedbyart’ was a casualty.

Now that we are back in the uncertain ‘worst of times’ lockdown, I have the time and space to resume the blog and provide a rundown of what I had anticipated writing about during May.

May begins with ‘May Day’ on the first of the month. This day was chosen in 1889 by the socialists and communists of the Second International as the date for ‘International Worker’s Day’ to commemorate the 1886 Haymarket affair in Chicago and the subsequent struggle for an eight-hour working day.

Despite considerable progress, the concerns about working conditions, casual and under- employment, wage stagnation, vulnerable industries and ‘financial compensation’ during inevitable COVID lockdowns, still persist. These have been particularly highlighted for women in the workplace.

The National Gallery of Victoria has a series of 10 photographs by Viv Méhes, taken in the 1980s, which address the conditions of working women. Méhes has worked as an Australian documentary photographer since the late 1970s and her work is best described as ‘advocacy through storytelling’. Themes of migration, displacement, dignity, and resilience inform her practice and she has worked collaboratively with communities on long-term projects to document marginalisation and disadvantage.

In each annotated photograph we meet a woman in her work environment. She is named and the challenges she confronts are briefly described. For example, we learn about Maria Giamakos: Women shift workers are found in two main areas: / (1) service areas, e.g. waitresses, barmaids, cooks, / cleaners, nurses, nursing aides; (2) industries such / as food processing, textiles, metal and electrical / trades, chemicals, rubber, plastics, tobacco. / Some of the most commonly reported dysfunctions are / chronic fatigue and insomnia, gastric upsets, anaemia, / weight loss, constipation, tension, nervousness and / increased irritability. These are common to all shift / workers but they are aggravated for women because of / domestic responsibilities which are shouldered by women. / Many women work at night so that their husbands who / work during the day can look after the children; most / women night workers prepare the evening meal before / they go to work so that their husbands only have to / heat it up for the family but they themselves are / unlikely to eat a proper main meal and this makes them / more susceptible to the dysfunctions mentioned above. / Tension builds up and leads to consumption of drugs / such as valium, and so a potential addiction is created. / The appointment of a union night organiser to handle / problems encountered on the night shift, provison of / child care facilities on a 24-hour basis, plus provision / of nutritious and appetising meals in factory canteens / to cater for workers on all shifts, would help to solve / some of the difficulties of shift workers. / Disruption of health, family and social life caused / by shift work should also be researched. / MARIA GIAMAKOS came from Greece in 1971 / and has worked as a cleaner since 1975.

And, also about Mercy Knight: Most industries which employ women employ men as their / overseers. There is great resistance from many men / to any change in this system, and this often leads to / sexual harassment. / Sexual harassment is any sexual advance made at work / which threatens a worker’s wellbeing. It is usually / an expression of power made by someone in authority. / Sexual harassment can take many forms – it can involve / unnecessary touching or patting, smutty jokes, / suggestive remarks or other verbal abuse, leering at / a person’s body, demanding sexual favours, compromising / invitations and physical assault. Some or all of / these may or may not be accompanied by direct or indirect / threats to the victim’s job or career. / Sexual harassment must be eradicated from the workplace. / Women should not feel ashamed or embarrassed about / their harassment; they should talk to other women / for support, and should make a complaint to their union / or other appropriate body to expose the offender. / MERCY KNIGHT is from India and has been / in Australia since 1974. She has worked / as a packer at this Melbourne meat / factory for seven years.

Méhes’ photograph of ‘A Melbourne textile factory’ provides an ideal segue to the current launch of a collaborative undertaking between Melbourne fashion brand ‘Gorman’ and artists from Arts Project Australia (APA). The eponymous fashion label was founded by Lisa Gorman – a young girl from rural Victoria who loved dress-making and thrift stores – over 20 years ago. Unlike Méhes’ picture of exploitation, Lisa Gorman has worked hard to develop a Code of Conduct (in line with International Labour Organisation’s principles) which lists its suppliers and audits some of its supply chain to ensure a living wage to workers.

Over the past year, Gorman has worked with eight APA artists to utilise their designs on a range of clothing. As Sue Roff, Executive Director of APA, notes: “Gorman’s respect and enthusiasm for the artists’ work, their professional approach to image licensing, and their interest in working directly with APA artists in the marketing and presentation of the collection has made this an exciting and creative collaboration”. The vibrant, colourful and abstract designs fit perfectly with Gorman’s signature pop textiles.

Georgia Szmerling is one of the artists featured in the collaboration. Szmerling has been with APA since 2003 and is a multi-disciplinary artist who draws, paints and works in ceramics. She is fascinated by the natural world and interprets the life of plants and water formations with both bold gestures and fine detail. A work from 2006 – ‘Field of flowers’ – is held in the NGV collection and is indicative of her longstanding fascination with local flora. Doubtless, some of Georgia’s creativity comes from her mother, Nita Jawary, who is an NGV guide and has contributed her wonderful ekphrastic poetry to this blog. Perhaps the NGV might add the Gorman dresses to their extensive collection of fashion?

The economic fallout from the pandemic was addressed in both the recent Federal and State budgets with an emphasis on stimulus and growth, and a recognition that considerable debt is necessary and important for the foreseeable future. Fortuitously, the day after the Federal Budget was released, the ‘Public Domain Review’ published an essay by Erika Vause on ‘The Art of Making Debts – Accounting for an Obsession in 19^th Century France’. This fascinating, humorous and timely essay looks at the literature and art of ‘dealing with debt and how to avoid creditors’ which was a feature of life in post-revolutionary France. A contemporary humourist, Emile Marco de Saint-Hilaire, commenting in 1827 on debt as one of the bases of social order, wrote: “The more debts one has, the more credit. The more creditors, the more resources”.

Vause points out that Saint-Hilaire was not alone in his ‘debt-shirking evangelism’ and provides many examples of how obsessed with avoiding financial obligations the French of this period were.   Hopefully, this thinking will not guide our current economic climate. The essay can be found at: https://publicdomainreview.org/essay/the-art-of-making-debts

Writing 30 years after Saint-Hilaire, Dickens’ France-based work of historical fiction could not be more different with its themes of injustice, sacrifice, and altruism. It is hoped that the current lockdown will ‘channel Dickens’ and reinvigorate the community spirit and concern for others that was so evident in our previous encounters with COVID outbreaks. It was in this context that I was reminded that the word ‘mayday’ – the emergency procedure word – comes from the phonetic equivalent of the French m’aidez which means ‘help me’.