Artists at Work
Exhibition showcases fruits of labor
Every day, UAW members excel in the workplace, and every year our members at Chrysler Corp. facilities across the country also showcase enormous creativity that flows beyond the shop floor.
Those UAW members are the artists whose works demonstrate talents ranging from pastel drawings and acrylic paintings to digital photography and metal sculpture.
The 2007-2008 Artists at Work competition marks the seventh juried art exhibition sponsored by the UAW-Chrysler Training Center. It’s the only employee art competition of its kind that is jointly sponsored by a major corporation and a labor union.
This year’s exhibit is the largest ever, attracting a record 1,869 entries. Judges from the professional arts community selected 80 artists and 166 pieces of art. They handed out first-, second- and third-place awards and 15 honorable mentions.
Among the participants are 34 UAW members from 20 Chrysler locations throughout the United States, including Christina Haylett of UAW Local 212 in Sterling Heights, Mich., and Terence Malosh from UAW Local 12 in Toledo, Ohio.
Haylett captured first place with her pastel drawing, titled “Courtney Sleeping,” and Malosh placed third for his “Eye of the Chicken” photograph.
“There are so many ways that UAW members express themselves creatively, and every year it is exciting to see the fruits of that labor,” said UAW Vice President General Holiefield, who directs the union’s Chrysler Department.
This year’s exhibition also includes an Invited Artists category for top winners from the 2005-2006 show who were not eligible to compete for a top award this year.
The judges for 2007-2008 were: Rebecca Tufts, a 2004 Cranbrook Academy of Art graduate who works at a suburban Detroit art gallery; Kegham Tazian, a professor of painting at Oakland (Mich.) Community College; Carole Harris, a fiber artist and founder of one of Michigan’s top African-American, female-owned interior design firms, and Lisa Konikow, coordinator of the fine arts show at the annual Arts, Beats and Eats in Pontiac, Mich.