I asked my mom to be funny “do you think manhole will ever be degendered?”, a laugh was followed by us discussing how it’s often occupations and not objects whose gender neutral synonyms are pushed for. My mom brought up the point that a manhole is purely occupational, and the only people that use them are workers. Of course she’s right but this got me thinking about how they occupy a certain invisible labor, a working class that we don’t talk or think of too much (not to the point of untouchables in the caste system, but maybe something of a double sided coin; work that is seen as dirty and not to be mentioned, and work that is part of a city ecosystem and opperates unmentioned)
There’s this artist, Mierle Laderman Ukeles, who was the first artist in resident for the NYC sanitation department back in 1977, and is the best (and first) matenience artist. This is a really good profile on her where you can read about a bunch of pieces she’s done that relate to subjects of sanitation, labor, cities, invisible labor, and more. She’s done pieces like Touch Sanitation, shaking the hands of 8500 sanitation workers, thanking them, talking to them, and documenting the process and conversations. She also has a piece Flow City which probably provides the best example of bridging the gap between the public and public workers, “the question that FLOW CITY poses is not really what is garbage, but what is reality? And how are we connected to it?”. This work aims to keep flow systems visible. By making a visitor center it actually involved changing zoning laws to make the municipal worksite where NYC trash passed through open to the public, and therefor visible and understood.
here’s a jstor link of the article I quote from Grand Street 57 DIRT
here’s a artnews article on Flow City
If you want to see NYC manhole covers being made you can watch this 26 minute documentary Cast in India (2014) by Natasha Raheja. Maybe it’s on your Kanopy?
anyways it’s funny to imagine switching to sewer, matienence, or utility hole (personhole ain’t it), and having a camp of people up in arms wanting to keep their manhole.
here’s my list of different kinds of negative spaces (holes and such)
maybe more utility hole than manhole but hey