If you don’t come in on Sunday, don’t come in on Monday: is contemporary clothing manufacture coming clean?
http://www.fashioninfilm.com/present2.htm
12-13 October 2007
Curated by Christel Tsilibaris
Knitoscope Testimonies video piece by Cat Mazza, 2006 (2,58 min)
No Sweat dir. Amie Williams, 2006 (54min)
Screening will be followed by a Q&A session with director Amie Williams
Knitoscope Testimonies is a computer-animated programme that translates the artist�s hand-knitted panels into moving images. The video focuses on labour movement, continuing Mazza's involvement with anti-sweatshop activism. For more information on Cat Mazza' projects visit www.microrevolt.org
No Sweat (dir. Amie Williams, 2006) takes us to Los Angeles, the largest and most dynamic area of garment production in North America. The film follows two self-proclaimed ethical labels American Apparel and SweatX T-shirt which have been widely recognised for providing fair working conditions in their factories. Founded by the entrepreneur Dov Charney and built from the ground up, American Apparel's anti-sweatshop rhetoric broadcasts care and workers' benefits such as healthcare, paid leave, company-subsidised lunches, free English language classes and even on-site masseurs. Similarly, the T-shirt company SweatX, with a start-up capital of 2.5million US dollars funded by Ben & Jerry's Ben Cohen, started with a determination to operate ethically. No Sweat takes us behind the scenes of these two 'worker-friendly' companies and unveils a different, much more distressing reality.
