Couple with Woman Wearing Sombrero with UFW Symbol
Item
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Title
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Couple with Woman Wearing Sombrero with UFW Symbol
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Rights
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Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington, D.C. Public Domain.
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Creator
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Unidentified Hourglass Prison Artist
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Date
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1998 C.E.
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Description
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When the Bracero Program ended in 1964, many farms turned to prisons in the Southwest for another source of cheap labor. Mexican Americans, who were widely incarcerated due to racial profiling by the police and border patrol, once again found their labor exploited by big agricultural farms. As late as 1978, prisons used Mexican American prisoners to pick cotton for no pay. Strikes and protests were rare in these prisons, but those that emerged drew inspiration from the United Farm Workers’ movement of the early 1960s to advocate for shorter work weeks and better working conditions. This drawing captures the connection between labor activism in the prisons and the farmworkers movement. The artist depicts a guard tower and a cell to represent prison laborers with a woman in the foreground wearing a sombrero that bears the United Farm Workers’ symbol.
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Format
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Drawing on cotton.
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Publisher
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Smithsonian American Art Museum.
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Contributor
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Melissa Valenzuela
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Identifier
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Smithsonian American Art Museum. 1998.126.14.
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Subject
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United Farm Workers Movement; labor rights; prison reform; Civil Rights; agriculture.
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Source
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Jpg file. The Smithsonian American Art Museum. 11/3/2021/ https://americanart.si.edu/artwork/couple-woman-wearing-sombrero-ufw-symbol-36763.
