art is work/work is art
ArtWalk
Hartford Public Library
Hartford
Oct. 1, 2026
Art is rarely as explicit as the new exhibit “art is work/work is art” on display at the ArtWalk gallery in the Hartford Public Library. Organizer and artist Joe Bun Keo has gathered the work of the people who put in the work by putting on a show featuring the art of individuals who work in art spaces.
The description minces no words:
“when you walk into a gallery, an exhibition space, or the halls of a museum, you are witness to a spectrum of art. sculptures, photographs, prints, drawings, paintings, immersive audio visual installations; all of this is physically manifested by the hard work of museum laborers, whom are often overlooked, underpaid, and exploited…”
It’s an important point to make, as I’ve certainly taken for granted the amount of work it takes to maintain a single gallery, much less an entire museum. The exhibit features the work of the people whose names I didn’t know, but who make seeing art possible: Allen Phillips is the Imaging and Publications Manager at the Wadsworth Atheneum; Chris Allen Cox is the Wadsworth’s Collection Manager; Christopher M. Schroeder is the Senior/Chief Preparator at Springfield Museums; Jon Eastman is a Senior Art Preparer at the Wadsworth as well.
Cox’s work Teevee Ain’t What It Used to Be (The Kitchen Sink) is an interesting mixed-media piece that seems to symbolize the challenges of the modern world. The spilled bottle of pills is certainly a commentary on the constant medicating the modern world requires, and placing it next to the macabre image of a disembodied child’s foot is an example of the horrors we see that we’re medicating against. The bottle and the scissors were another stressor/relaxant relationship, with the scissors representing work and the bottle, an empty alcoholic beverage.
Eastman’s contribution to the gallery is eight separate small pieces made of wood, acrylic and gesso (a paint primer). The sculptures feel like frozen pieces of time itself. The intricacies of the individual sculptures must have taken exorbitant amounts of focus and effort, which is the hardest thing to maintain for working artists. There’s no lack of creativity among laborers, but as the saying goes, time is money. Spending so much on such detailed work, after a day of presenting other’s work, feels like an act of defiance against pressures that make us work for money as much as possible.
I appreciate the gallery’s message about labor, art and the people who work hard to put together the galleries and exhibits we enjoy. Still, I’d be remiss if I didn’t note the labor stratification the exhibit embodies as well. After all, there’s no work from janitors, kitchen employees or security guards on display. Even among the invisible, there are people who remain unseen.
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art is work/work is art will be on display at Hartford Public Library through Oct. 31.
Lots of gallery openings these past few weeks! Jamil goes to Trinity College to check out a new alumni exhibit.
