Mierle Laderman Ukeles facts for kids

Mierle Laderman Ukeles (born 1939) is an American artist. She lives and works in New York City. Her art often focuses on ideas from the feminist art movement. She connects the idea of "process" in art to everyday tasks like cleaning and caring for things. Since 1977, she has been the Artist in Residence for the New York City Department of Sanitation. This means she works with the city's trash and recycling department.

About Mierle Laderman Ukeles

Mierle Laderman Ukeles was born in Denver, Colorado, in 1939. She is Jewish and her father was a rabbi. She studied history at Barnard College. Later, she began her art training at the Pratt Institute in New York in 1962. She also studied art education at the University of Denver. She got married in 1966 and had her first child two years later. In 1974, she earned a Master's degree from New York University.

Her Art Career

In 1969, Ukeles wrote an important paper called Maintenance Art Manifesto 1969! Proposal for an exhibition "CARE". She wrote it while thinking about her roles as an artist and a mother. She wanted to show that the daily tasks of keeping things clean and organized are important. She called herself a "maintenance artist."

What is Maintenance Art?

For Ukeles, "maintenance" means all the activities that keep things going. This includes cooking, cleaning, and raising children at home. It also includes public tasks like cleaning buildings or streets. She even thought about "earth maintenance," like cleaning up polluted water. Her art shows and performances aimed to make people aware of how important these jobs are. Often, these jobs are not paid well, or housewives are not paid at all. In her shows, she would do the same tasks she did every day.

Artist in Residence

Since 1977, Ukeles has had a very special job. She is the Artist in Residence for the New York City Department of Sanitation. She is the only artist to ever hold this position. This means she works with the people who collect trash and keep the city clean. In 2019, she won the Francis J. Greenburger Award for her amazing art.

Major Art Projects

In 1989, Ukeles worked on a project at the Fresh Kills Landfill in Staten Island. This was a huge landfill, the largest man-made site. The project aimed to turn it into a park called Freshkills Park. Ukeles invited people from all over New York City to make small artworks from trash.

In 2020, Ukeles created a new artwork called For ⟶ forever.... It was a 15-second video shown on billboards in Times Square. It also appeared on the Queens Museum and subway screens. The video showed a message:

Dear Service Worker,
"Thank you for keeping NYC alive!"
For ⟶ forever...

This was a way to thank essential workers during a difficult time.

Ideas Behind Her Art

Ukeles sees the artist's role as an activist. She wants to inspire people to change how society values certain jobs. Her art challenges the idea that an artist is someone who works alone, separate from daily life. For Ukeles, art is not just a finished product. It's an ongoing process connected to everyday life. Her Manifesto for Maintenance Art says that art can include everyday, ordinary activities.

The Maintenance Art Manifesto

Ukeles wrote her Manifesto For Maintenance Art in 1969. She wrote it after her first child was born. She realized she had to balance being an artist with being a mother. She felt that famous male artists didn't have to make such choices. She felt like two different people: "the free artist" and "the mother/maintenance worker." Then she had an idea: she could call maintenance "art." She could combine her freedom as an artist with her daily duties.

The manifesto talks about two main ideas: "Development" and "Maintenance."

• Development is about creating new things and making changes.
• Maintenance is about keeping things clean, preserving what's new, and making changes last.

Ukeles asked, "After the revolution, who’s going to pick up the garbage on Monday morning?" This questioned the traditional art world. It often ignored the everyday reality of an artist's life.

The second part of her manifesto describes her idea for an art show. She said: "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 [...] MY WORKING WILL BE THE WORK."

Touch Sanitation (1979-80)

Touch Sanitation is one of Ukeles' most famous projects. It was a performance art piece that lasted almost a year. Ukeles met over 8,500 employees of the New York Sanitation Department. She shook hands with each of them. She said, "Thank you for keeping New York City alive." She wrote down her conversations with the workers. She wanted to change how people thought about these workers. She used her art to challenge negative ideas about them.

Awards and Recognition

Mierle Laderman Ukeles has received many important awards and honors. She has honorary doctorates from several art schools. Some of her awards include:

• Francis J. Greenburger Award, Art Omi, 2019
• Public Art Dialogue Award, College Art Association, 2017
• Lily Auchincloss Foundation, 2015
• The Shelley & Donald Rubin Foundation, 2015
• Queens Museum Honoree, 2015
• Ann Chamberlain Distinguished Fellow, San Francisco Art Institute, 2010
• Jewish Cultural Achievement Awards, National Foundation for Jewish Culture, 2003
• Anonymous was a Woman Foundation Award, 2001

Selected Works

• Manifesto For Maintenance Art 1969! Proposal for an Exhibition "CARE" (1969) - This was her proposal to show maintenance work as modern art. It was published in Artforum magazine in 1971.
• Maintenance Art Tasks (1973) - A collection of photographs showing daily household activities. Ukeles and her husband performed these tasks.
• Hartford Wash: Washing/Tracks/Maintenance: Outside (1973) and Hartford Wash: Washing/Tracks/Maintenance: Inside (1973) - These were performances where Ukeles cleaned parts of the Wadsworth Atheneum museum. She did this as part of an all-female art show.
• Touch Sanitation (1978–80) - Her project where she thanked sanitation workers.
• The Work Ballets (1983-2013) - These were seven "ballets" using large machines. They took place in different cities around the world.
• Turnaround Surround (1997-2002) - A path made of "Glassphalt" (glass and asphalt) in Danehy Park in North Cambridge, Massachusetts. The park was built on an old dump and landfill.