Working America
September 5–October 20
McKune Room | Open During Library Hours*
*Exhibit closes 30 minutes prior to the library’s closing.
In the photography exhibition Working America, artist Sam Comen presents American immigrants and first-generation Americans at work in the small, skilled trades as icons of the American experience. The subjects share stories of economic independence and struggle, belonging and exclusion, faith and fear, and service to both community and family.
A variety of themes are explored in the portraits and accompanying interviews, including the dignity of work, inequity among immigrant nationalities, the political relevance of labor migrants, the intergenerational legacies of inherited skills, the learning of new skills to adapt to the new land of opportunity, and the relationship between a nation’s identity and the identities of the individuals who comprise that nation.
Working America is a meditation on American belonging and American becoming, it poetically acknowledges the lives of and contributions that working men and women make as a part of our country and our collective experience.
CDL Celebrates Chelsea Community Workers
Inspired by Working America, Chelsea District Library seeks to explore the spectrum of workers who contribute to our thriving community. We invite our local business community to help us create Working Chelsea—a collection of photographs and quotes from the working people of Chelsea. Designed to highlight the front line worker, this series will feature workers in skilled trades, small businesses, farming, and service industry positions. Photos will be displayed at Chelsea District Library and online Sep. 5–Oct. 20.
Please submit a 5″ x 7″ photograph of one or more employees and the answer
to one of the following questions:
1. What do you like most about your job?
2. What do you wish people knew about your job?
Please send submissions by Aug. 1.
Questions? Or prefer to have CDL staff take the photo?
Call us at 734-475-8732 x.217 or email hello@chelseadistrictlibrary.org.
Photo credit: Andrew Jameson, Wikimedia Commons
