Baha Targün with a megaphone at the Ford factory gate in Cologne-Niehl, August 1973 © Gernot HuberStrike! Photo Stories of Labor Struggles
Exhibition
20.05. – 03.10.2022
Friday, 20 May 2022
Mon: 10.00 am – 9.00 pm, Wed – Fri: 10.00 am – 5.00 pm, Sat – Sun: 10.00 am – 6.00 pm
See opening hours Museum der ArbeitStrike! Photo Stories of Labor Struggles
Stiftung Historische Museen Hamburg—Museum der Arbeit
Wiesendamm 3, 22305 Hamburg
20.5. – 3.10.2022
shmh.de
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This exhibition presents a photographic history of key labor struggles and momentum from the 1960s to the current gig economy. Organized as a set of chapters, Strike! Photo Stories of Labor Struggles takes the structural crises of leading regional industries in the Ruhr region and Hamburg in the 1960s and 1980s as a starting point for the development of strike culture in Germany. Also explored are the UK miners’ strike of 1984–1985, the sans-papiers of France, led by migrant workers from 1996 onwards, and the 2012 strike of South African miners in the region of Marikani. With a focus on photography, Strike! explores how awareness and solidarity spread through a visual culture of labor struggles, affecting both participants and the self-image of trade unions.
The majority of the images presented were taken by photojournalists who accompanied the labor struggles. The photo archive of the Ruhr Museum Essen contains the estates and archives of a number of significant photographers, among them Anton Tripp, Manfred Scholz, and Klaus Rose, while series held by the Museum der Arbeit, DOMiD in Cologne, Magnum Paris, and the photographers themselves enrich this presentation. Through oral history and ephemera, Strike! aims to center the protagonists of these movements and public response to these actions.
Curated by Stefan Rahner.