Work and Workers

Art depicting or referencing work or the workforce, whether portraits of professionals or scenes of people doing their jobs. Major historical examples include the Mexican Muralists, the American Social Realists of the 1920s and '30s, and painters like Gustave Courbet who were engaged with socialist ideas. Modern and contemporary artists have by no means ignored work as subject matter—particularly photographers like Sebastião Salgado, whose photographs of international labor have become touchstones for workers' rights advocacy.