1958, I-IV
Digitally printed silk organza, cotton and linen fabric, embroidery thread
On March 21, 1958, women unionists gathered outside Parliament House, holding a rally to congratulate premier John Cahill, who promised to introduce equal pay before the next election. The NSW government was the first to propose equal pay under state awards. At the time, women under Federal and N.S.W. awards received 75 per cent of the male basic wage.
The announcement was met with resistance by employer groups. The secretary of the Employer's Federation, Mr P. J. Self, said:
"The wage structure is built around a social wage, that of the adult male. He is supposed to earn a minimum wage sufficient to maintain a wife and family…It will mean that the single women will enjoy a much improved standard of living….the family man and his family will experience a reductor in their standard of living. The single man, who should be able to save for marriage and family responsibilities, is going to find his costs will go up and he will be less able to make provision for married life. In short, it will discourage marriage, which in a young developing country like Australia is an utterly futile policy. The ultimate cost of equal pay will not be borne by industry but by the family man."
Source: Sydney Morning Herald, 2018.
Design
The image of women protesting equal pay is embellished, but not in a way that would have been judged “artistic” in 1958; frayed edges, thread left hanging, embellishing the frame not the subject. These four experiments with altering an historical, mainstream, image of women protesting are intended to invite the viewer into the embellisher’s perspective…on the margin, outside of the conventional paradigm for framing and enhancing.
Materials
The images are digitally printed on silk organza, placed on a base of domestic linen or cotton organdie. The embellishment is made with stranded embroidery thread.