PRESS RELEASE
Expanding their reach beyond the confines of the immediate Wall Street area, a group of around a dozen labor activists from #OCCUPYWALLSTREET today disrupted an auction of contemporary art at the auction house Sotheby’s, on Manhattan’s Upper East Side, in support of unionized art handlers locked out of their jobs by the company’s management.
Disguised as potential bidders, the activists entered the building and began their disruption at approximately 10:45 a.m., interrupting the auctioneer one at a time with shouts to “end the lockout” and “make Wall Street pay.” All of the protestors, who staggered their interruptions throughout a period of approximately 75 minutes, were escorted off the premises by security. No arrests were made.
“What’s being done to the art handlers is plain wrong,” said Will Russell, a student at Hunter College and one of the demonstrators who interrupted the auction. “Sotheby’s made $690 million in gross profit last year – but they can’t afford to pay their workers a fair wage? It’s ridiculous.”
Actress Ashley Straw also participated.
“The greed in this building is a direct example of the corporate greed that has ruined our economy,” she said. “Sotheby’s is auctioning off good middle class jobs to the lowest bidder.”
#OCCUPYWALLSTREET has released the following statement about the situation at Sotheby’s:
#OCCUPYWALLSTREET supporters are appalled at the persistent attack on workers rights. We support the right of the workers to collectively bargain. Sotheby’s wants all new hires to have no collective bargaining rights, no health benefits and no job security. After locking out their unionized work force, Sotheby’s continues to operate using scabs and a non-union subcontractor. Sotheby’s art auctions epitomize the disconnect of the extremely wealthy from the rest of us.
The 43 locked-out workers, all members of Teamsters Local 814, were locked out of their jobs by the company’s management on August 1, in the midst of contract negotiations. Among its demands, Sotheby’s, which just had its most profitable year ever in its 267 years of business and whose CEO, Bill Ruprecht, is paid approximately $60,000 a day, wants the art handlers to give up their 401K plan and work a reduced 36-hour week, effectively a 10 percent wage cut. The company also wants to cap workers’ overtime, eliminate certain titles that pay more, and, in initial bargaining, wanted workers to give up their right to sue over charges of discrimination.
The action today marks the first time that the dispute at Sotheby’s has spilled from the street onto the auction floor.
#OCCUPYWALLSTREET is an ongoing anti-corporate protest encampment, now in its sixth day, situated in Liberty Square (formerly Zuccotti Park) in lower Manhattan’s financial district.