Women at Work – Crossroads, Rhythms, and Continuities is a video installation created by artists Simona Deaconescu (RO) and Flor Firvida Martin (ARG/MEX). It brings together stories, professions, and movements of women from Mexico and Romania who work in occupations where their bodies are the primary source of income.
Through a series of interviews conducted in both countries, with the participation of 11 women: Maria, Candelaria, Geta, Cassandra, Petra, Larisa, Elvira, America, Billie Rose, Nina, Gabi, Women at Work shares a convergence of experiences, bodies, times and spaces.
A twerker and a social worker, a plasterer, a basketball coach, a stringing performance artist, a doula healer, a lucha libre fighter, a transgender seamstress and cook, a sex worker, a civil servant who fights for the rights of people with disabilities, a worker in a glass factory, a professional dancer who practices sports pole dancing and contemporary dance are part of this complex picture.
“How much do you earn? How much would you like to win? What is it like to do your job as a woman? What’s it like to do this in your city? Would you like to do something different? How do you feel in your body when you perform it?” are some of the questions explored.
Women at Work explores the choreography of work, aspects of women’s economies in different spaces, reflections on what it means to be a woman, the demands, expectations, desires, affections, and violence women experience, and the communities, care, and connections they realize them.
The installation was presented in Bucharest between October 26-29 in the space /SAC @ MALMAISON. It will be able to be visited in Timișoara between November 2-5 at the HEI – House of European Institutes in Cetatea Bastion as part of the Timișoara Performing Arts Festival.
Cover photo: Claudiu Popescu
