Work values, Valuable work

Annelies Clerix

Through a series of manual laundry workshops, Work values, Valuable work creates a parallel to the domestic context in order to overcome the un-acknowledgement of domestic reproductive labour and rigid social values of the household. Set in different forms of public space - a museum, an urban garden, a socio-cultural projectroom - and taking place within a unique scenography - a felted tapestry-, the workshops bring people together to reflect and discuss about the politics of the home.

Doing laundry in particular and domestic care work in general reflects society. By cleaning, cooking, washing a mother, wife, sister, daughter, allows the other members of the household to go to work and have leisure. But who is taking care of the womxn doing this labor?

By rethinking the laundry heritage, of gathering in a public space to manually wash their laundry together, Annelies invited participants to appreciate and acknowledge the one who’s responsible for the domestic labour. The washing cycle is transformed into a tool, a moment for collective reflection about politics of the home and a challenges to unlearn social hierarchies.

In short, Work values, Valuable work serves as a framework through which we reflect, act and engage amongst each other within the domestic context. It is a research in how embodied performance in the public space could invite us to re-imagine of alternative modes of being together in the home.