Anthony Ruatto, Matthew Trent, Ryan Johnson, Dorian Pierce, Valets, Hollywood Casino, Shreveport, LA

Artist elin o'Hara slavick American, born 1965

Date2001

MediumChromogenic print

Dimensionsheight and width: 27 × 28 in. (68.6 × 71.1 cm)
frame: 28 1/2 × 29 1/2 in. (72.4 × 74.9 cm)

ClassificationsPhotography

Credit LinePurchased with funds from the William R. Roberson Jr. and Frances M. Roberson Endowed Fund for North Carolina Art

Object number2006.20.1

On View

Not on view

Label TextThis work is from an on-going series titled Workers Dreaming that slavick started in 1999. There are now over 75 photographs in the series, evocative portraits of workers from all over the world. She captures all of these workers in a poetic moment—as they take a break from work that is often relentless, monotonous, and at times, grueling—and she portrays them as people who have lives away from their jobs. She catches them when they have stopped to pause or rest, and asks them to close their eyes for a minute, so that she can present them as people who have dreams and wishes that transcend the everyday drudgery of work and labor.

As slavick has said, “Workers Dreaming honors the imaginary space and intellectual agency of workers. -- They are majestic, mortal, heroic, tired, beautiful and really human. Denying us their gaze but offering us a meditative space, they are empowered, lost in their own imaginings, desires, hopes and self-consciousness.”
[L. Dougherty, 2007]
ProvenanceCreated Shreveport, LA, 2001; collection of the artist, Chapel Hill, NC; sold to NCMA, 2006.
Published ReferencesLinda Dougherty and Kinsey Katchka, "The Big Picture," Preview: The Magazine of the North Carolina Museum of Art (July/August 2007), noted and illus. (color detail) 7.
Exhibition HistoryRaleigh, NC, North Carolina Museum of Art, "The Big Picture," March 18-September 2, 2007.

Raleigh, NC, North Carolina Museum of Art, “Close to Home,” February 14–August 10, 2014.

Raleigh, NC, North Carolina Museum of Art, “To Be Young: Coming of Age in the Contemporary” [Part 2], September 28, 2021-April 5, 2022.

Raleigh, NC, North Carolina Museum of Art, "The People's Collection Reimagined," November 30, 2023-May 29, 2024.

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