Research Blog #10 11|9|14

             The name of the artist I have received is Mierle Ukeles. She is an artist that began her work in New York City. She was primarily involved with feminist works but also did a lot of work involving the ecology of the areas. "I am an artist. I am a woman. I am a wife. I am a mother. (Random order) I do a hell of a lot of washing, cleaning, cooking, renewing, supporting, preserving, etc. Also, (up to now separately) I ‘do’ Art. Now I will simply do these everyday things, and flush them up to consciousness, exhibit them, as Art" (Ukeles, 1969). This a quote from Ukeles's book Manifesto for Maintenance Art 1969! and what she is saying is that her art is part of her daily life. It becomes part of her womanhood and part of everything she does. She wants to acknowledge her acts as something more than just daily chores. To her the maintenance art that she works on is a representation of everything she is and does. All the washing and cleaning, it's all interconnected with all the maintenance workers and people who help in the city. Its almost like one giant circle. Mierle Ukeles is an artist and woman who does what she does because it defines her in a way that connects her with the community and world that surrounds her. 
           The piece that I have been assigned to work on is Ukeles's Touch Sanitation project. I have mentioned that Ukeles does the work she does because she feels like all these works are interconnected. She also does this work because she feels that without the works of the maintenance crew she wouldn't be able to do something of the things se does. Without workers the entire world would be different and wouldn't be able to function. Ukeles greeted, thanked, and shook the hands personally of 8, 500 maintenance workers on their way to their jobs. She felt as though that she was thanking the workers individually for what they have been doing. Ukeles felt as though she connected herself with the workers. She wanted them to know first hand that people thanked them for their works. 
          In the book Social Works: Preforming Art, Supporting Publics by Shannon Jackson it discussed how movie WALL-E was based off of Ukeles work in maintenance arts. At the very end of the movie when the humans return back to earth they decide that the only way to rebuild our planet was to work together. It also mentions in the chapter High Maintenance they quote Ukeles as saying "I loved it because it was very clear thinking; also I felt like I reordering every social relationship" (Jackson 75). Ukeles's work was being done not only being done for her feminist views but also her she wanted to connect the community around her. The entire chapter is on her works and how she involved the community in each and every one of them. She also wanted to appreciate landfills as something like a sculpture of the city, created by the community. In the article from ARTnews it mentions how she is connected all the different works that influenced other projects like the one Vik Muniz did in Brazil. Ukeles is an influence for so many different works of art. She wanted to connect everyone together because they are all such huge parts of her like. Also with her feminist views it comes into play equality of the genders and of people. She wanted to "differentiate the differentiated" (Jackson 76).  Which basically means that she wanted those who were looked down up in maintenance to be admired as their own work of art like the garbage dumps. It connected everyone to one another. Ukeles wanted to connect everyone together and show their differences as something positive. This was her way of showing equality. Ukeles did all of this to bring community together since they all work intertwined with one another. 
                Overall, Ukeles's works have influenced works by Vik Muniz and others. Muniz has spread his works much farther across the globe in comparison to Ukeles who has stayed mainly in New York City. The idea of maintenance art has been widely spread though by other artist over the view that garbage can too be a work of art. The idea that a garbage pile can be an art statue of the city was created by Ukeles. It would be a piece of art created by the entire community. Their art is what unifies them. The garbage that they throw away all comes together in one pile and creates something. This also works with recycling the garbage for something, which is a huge worldly attempt at trying to keep the world healthy and less dirty. It's a way of making something beautiful out of something not-so-beautiful. But at the same time it connects everyone together through their trash.