32BJ SEIU inaugurated its 19th annual art exhibition over the weekend. Art enthusiasts came out to the union’s 25 West 18th Street headquarters in Manhattan to take a look at the works produced by 190 current and retired 32BJ members.
Everyday workers –– people who are employed as security officers, commercial cleaners, residential building service workers, and airport workers –– got the chance to show the worlds they could recreate through art.
This year’s art exhibition displayed works created under the theme “Sewing Peace.” It’s a subject that was proposed by Lilia Esther Barahona Barrera, a 32BJ member who works as a seasonal maintenance worker at Citi Field.
Barahona Barrera said in a statement that she chose the Sewing Peace theme in response to today’s political realities: “I based this work on the state of the world we face today,” she said. “It is an invitation to reflect on global peace. Through it, I wish to leave a message of union, reconstruction, and harmony. I firmly believe that we, as individuals, as well as our governments, can weave peace and build bridges between borders.”
Guayaquil, Ecuador-born Naja Quintero graduated with a fine arts degree in her native country and today runs a childcare center in New Jersey. A 23-year member of 32BJ, Quintero loves to use recycled materials in her works and considers herself privileged to have been able to teach art to the children in her care. “Giving life to things that otherwise would have been thrown away, that’s what I love to do,” she said. “You take things that were thrown out and put them together according to your ideas, depending on the idea you have. You become a small architect. But you are an artist. That is the secret. And then what was to be thrown away becomes something that could be a gift for somebody, and it costs zero, nothing.” Quintero says the children in her care are fascinated by being able to create recycled art and have learned that not everything has to be used once and then thrown away.
Jacqueline Lamont, an art and sewing instructor at Pratt Institute, worked with health care worker retirees from 1199 SEIU, 32BJ’s sister union, to create the rag dolls that are on display at the show. For some of the retirees, this class was their first time working with textiles and sewing. “We cut out all the pieces for the clothes. We had to embroider the faces, stuff them, then sew the clothes together, put the hair on, and everything. Then in the art classes, they painted and put leather, because it spells out ‘peace’ and ‘love’ when they’re lined up.”
A retired graphic designer originally from Shanghai, Queens-based Jiqing Fu said she bases her art on her surroundings. One of the pieces she brought for display was an oil painting that depicted her standing alongside her grandsons.
Meanwhile, the mostly self-taught realist artist, Julius A. Gastón Sr., had paintings titled “The Motorcycle Racer,” “The Teacups,” and “My Buddy Charlie” on display. “I challenge myself to do different things,” he told the AmNews, “to see if I can continue to do the hard lines, soft lines, and fade lines. And I always choose different topics.”
“If there’s one takeaway I have from this year’s show,” 32BJ SEIU President Manny Pastreich said in a statement, “it’s that art has never been more important – and from working artists in particular. Our members are harnessing their incredible talents to share their perspectives on all kinds of issues, from climate change and global conflict, to what’s going on in their own communities. Through their art, they are expressing so much of what is otherwise lost in daily life and discourse. Working artists are here, they have something to say, and I think people will do well to listen.”