Art that opens conversation...
ON EQUAL TERMS
Women in Construction and Skilled Trades
A Mixed-Media Installation by Susan Eisenberg
On Equal Terms combines realistic and fanciful works of art with personal testimonies to bring viewers into the experiences of women who work on construction sites. The exhibition celebrates the pioneers, as well as the tradeswomen and their allies who have kept the gates open for three decades.
The installation’s launch coincided with the 30th anniversary of affirmative action for women in the construction industry. In 1978, the federal government enacted policies that opened construction jobs and apprenticeship programs to women. Had those policies been enforced beyond the initial years, the construction workforce would likely now be roughly 25 percent female. Instead, women today hold less that 3 percent of building trades jobs. Questions raised by that discrepancy –– between policy expectation and outcome –– inspired the installation.
ON EQUAL TERMS is a site-specific 700-1600 square-foot mixed media installation that combines realistic and fanciful works of art with personal testimony to bring viewers into the experiences of women who work on construction sites. The installation includes audio, poetry, found objects, photographs, historical artifacts and 3-D mixed media — including Stella, a life-sized figure on a ladder in a diamond hardhat, a 6 X 6 ft plywood bathroom shack, and a “My Kids Know Which Bridges in Town Are Mine!” cake.
Artist Statement
I entered the construction industry in 1978, with training in poetry and theater. From the start, the arts helped me to shape and articulate what I experienced. In turn, my own impressions were shifted by responses from others who worked in the trades, who let me know what resonated for them, as well as what they found missing, or out of balance.
The stories on banners and audio are from my interviews for We’ll Call You If We Need You. Stella, the lifesize figure on the ladder in the diamond hardhat, wears the Carhartt coveralls I wore through Boston winters. The tags on her have been filled out by tradeswomen. The faces that combine for her mask come largely from Tradeswomen Magazine, a journal that for 20 years linked a national movement of tradeswomen, many of whom were extremely isolated. I hope that Stella –– and the exhibit as a whole –– conveys the contradictions of being both armored and vulnerable, welcomed and assaulted, alone and in community. At the other end of the cable that Stella’s pulling in, she has a partner.
ON EQUAL TERMS PROJECT
The On Equal Terms Project uses personal testimony and the arts as springboards for public education, discussion, and action about occupational segregation. The Project organizes touring for the On Equal Terms mixed media installation, as well as workshops, trainings, and artist-in-residencies. Exhibitions link the sponsoring gallery with a community advisory committee to produce events that celebrate tradeswomen; expand career opportunities for young women through Building Our Futures programming; and advance local and national initiatives toward economic justice within a human rights framework.
Susan Eisenberg, Director / On Equal Terms Project
Women’s Studies Research Center / Brandeis University
Mailstop 079 – Epstein Building
515 South St.
Waltham, MA 02454-9110
On Equal Terms Is funded in part by Mass Humanities.
Exhibitions
On Equal Terms
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