How an artist who stands with Teamsters sat in Hoffa's chair

<span style="line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">UPDATES to clarify Bowers is not from New York.</span></span><br /><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></span><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">An artist who stood with Teamsters in our battle against the Frieze New York Art Fair seized an opportunity to sit in <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jimmy_Hoffa" rel="nofollow">Jimmy Hoffa's</a><span style="font-size: small;"> chair on a recent trip to Detroit. </span></span></span><br /><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="line-height: 115%;">Andrea Bowers </span><a href="http://teamsternation.blogspot.com/2013/05/teamsters-take-stand-at-randalls-island.html" rel="nofollow" style="line-height: 18.18181800842285px;">openly protested at the Frieze New York Art Fair</a><span style="line-height: 18.18181800842285px;"> in May when the show refused to hire local Teamsters at fair wages. She and fellow artist Olga </span><span style="line-height: 18.18181800842285px;">Koumoundouros </span><span style="line-height: 18.18181800842285px;">drove</span><span style="line-height: 115%;"> </span><a href="https://www.facebook.com/TransamericaRoadsideSale" style="line-height: 115%;">their latest art installation</a><span style="line-height: 115%;">across the country, visiting historic labor sites along the way. Bowers, a</span><span style="line-height: 115%;"> former member of the <a href="http://www.aft.org/" rel="nofollow">American Federation of Teachers</a>, focuses much of her artwork on the struggle for workers' rights. That's why Bowers was blown away by the chance to sit in the former Teamster leader's chair at Teamsters Local 299. Said Bowers:</span></span><br /><blockquote class="tr_bq"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="line-height: 18.18181800842285px;">It was a rare and amazing opportunity. </span><span style="line-height: 18.18181800842285px;">That room was </span><span style="line-height: 18.18181800842285px;">beautiful.  The whole office was preserved.</span></span></blockquote><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhOdY5RBH_QgcDx2tCK-eQnsU2SMIPIviQhXwG6NmBJaQ6HkRcKve2wdh5zlGkKHjOlLCdn1sYf7gpZUa6IUKEkI925NuoFzQUwLJvXut9dAVTCByAV1drGSQ7a_Z5tHCe3kpX8BjKYH5tv/s320/Local+299.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="240" /></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">At Teamsters Local 299, in Jimmy Hoffa's chair</td></tr></tbody></table><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhOdY5RBH_QgcDx2tCK-eQnsU2SMIPIviQhXwG6NmBJaQ6HkRcKve2wdh5zlGkKHjOlLCdn1sYf7gpZUa6IUKEkI925NuoFzQUwLJvXut9dAVTCByAV1drGSQ7a_Z5tHCe3kpX8BjKYH5tv/s1600/Local+299.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"></span></a><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Shawn Ellis, an <a href="http://teamster.org/" rel="nofollow">International Brotherhood of Teamsters</a> staff member who introduced the artists to Detroit's labor history, said Andrea's smile was a mile wide when she sat in Jimmy Hoffa's chair. </span></span><br /><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="line-height: 18.18181800842285px;">At the invitation of Joint Council 43 President Greg Nowak, Bowers and </span><span style="line-height: 18.18181800842285px;">Koumoundouros also visited "<a href="http://detroit1701.org/American%20Labor%20Movement%20Statue.html" rel="nofollow">Transcending</a>," a memorial in downtown </span><span style="line-height: 18.18181800842285px;">Detroit dedicated to the Michigan labor movement.</span></span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: inherit; line-height: 115%;">They also attended a <a href="http://mlhs.wayne.edu/" rel="nofollow">MichiganLabor History Society</a> meeting on the Woolworth strike -- and gave a report on the successful effort to raise the labor standards for art fairs and other events in New York's public parks.<br /><br />“We actually took notes,” said Bowers.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">  </span>“It was so rewarding to meet these amazing union members concerned about labor history.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">  </span>We wanted to stay another week.”<br /><br />The 1937 Detroit Woolworth strike ignited worker activism across the country during the Great Depression.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">  It was s</span>tarted by a bunch of teenage and early-20-something women, at a company so huge, “<a href="http://www.workers.org/2010/us/woolworth_0318/" rel="nofollow">it was like striking Wal-Mart, the Gap, and McDonald’s all at the same time</a>.” The protest improved the jobs of tens of thousands of workers:</span><br /><blockquote class="tr_bq"><span style="font-family: inherit;">On Feb. 27, more than 100 young women workers at (a) Woolworth store demanded raises, time and a half for more than 40 hours, company pay for uniforms, lunch allowances, breaks, (union) recognition and hiring only through the union. The union had only one staff person there.  </span></blockquote><blockquote class="tr_bq"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The effects of the strike rippled for a year.  In Detroit itself, sit-downs spread among thousands of local workers, from waitresses to kitchen workers to cafeteria, hotel, and factory workers. By year’s end, chain variety stores, grocery and department stores had been organized in St. Paul and Duluth, Minn.; Tacoma and Centralia, Wash.; Superior, Wis.; and San Francisco.</span></blockquote><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="line-height: 115%;">“(The whole trip) was just moving,” said Koumoundouros. </span><span style="line-height: 115%;"> </span><span style="line-height: 115%;">“It was so amazing to see labor history alive.”</span></span><br /><br />

frieze james r. hoffa labor history Local 299 How an artist who stands with Teamsters sat in Hoffa's chair

UPDATES to clarify Bowers is not from New York. An artist who stood with Teamsters in our battle against the Frieze New York Art Fair seized...

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