Stanford University
Exhibition

Day Jobs

March 6–July 21, 2024

An image of a woman on the left and a few other pictures on the right hand side depicting two men and a couple and three pairs of shoes

Margaret Kilgallen, Money to Loan (Paintings for the San Francisco Bus Shelter Posters) [detail], 2000. Mixed media on paper and fabric, sheet 68 × 48½ inches (172.72 × 123.19 cm.) each. Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, gift of the estate of Margaret Kilgallen and partial purchase with funds provided by Julia Rothschild Foundation. Courtesy of the Margaret Kilgallen Estate, photo by Tony Prikryl

Pigott Family Gallery (142)
Freidenrich Family Gallery (221)
Ruth Levison Halperin Gallery (211)
Lynn Krywick Gibbons Gallery (210)

 

This exhibition examines the overlooked impact of day jobs on the visual arts. Success for artists is often measured by their ability to quit a day job and focus full time on their practice. Yet, these jobs can often spur creative growth by providing artists with new materials and methods, hands-on knowledge of a specific industry that becomes an area of artistic investigation, or a predictable paycheck and structure that enable unpredictable ideas. First presented at the Blanton Museum of Art at The University of Texas in Austin in 2023, the exhibition now features a larger selection of works by California-based artists such as Margaret Kilgallen, Jay Lynn Gomez, Barbara Kruger, Ahree Lee, Jim Campbell, Narsiso Martinez, and Sandy Rodriguez, and is comprised of more than 90 works by 36 established and emerging artists based in the United States.

The exhibition will be accompanied by a catalogue with commissioned essays and interviews from 24 pioneering artists such as Larry Bell, Mark Bradford, Tishan Hsu, Howardena Pindell, and Julia Scher, who offer first-hand accounts of how their day jobs—as a frame shop technician, hair stylist, word processor, museum employee, and security systems installer, respectively—altered their artistic trajectories in surprisingly profound ways.

By examining the impact of day jobs on artists, the exhibition seeks to demystify artistic production and overturn the romanticized concept of the artist sequestered in their studio, waiting for inspiration to strike. Conceived as a corrective to traditional art historical narratives, Day Jobs encourages us to more openly acknowledge the precarious and generative ways that economic and creative pursuits are intertwined.

 

Advisory note: two galleries in this exhibition have low lighting and a video with brief strobing effects. Signs are posted to alert visitors outside each respective gallery.

 

Day Jobs is curated by Veronica Roberts, John and Jill Freidenrich Director, Cantor Arts Center, with Jorge Sibaja, curatorial assistant, Cantor. The exhibition was organized by the Blanton Museum of Art and has been expanded at the Cantor.
We gratefully acknowledge lead support for Day Jobs provided by Pamela and David Hornik. Major support is provided by Hilary Ley Jager and Edwin Jager, and Anonymous. Generous support is provided by the Ellsworth Kelly Foundation, Suzanne Deal Booth, Anthony Meier Jr. and Celeste Meier, Judy and Charles Tate, and Carl and Marilynn Thoma. Additional support is provided by Lea Weingarten, Anonymous, Jeanne and Mickey Klein, Suzanne McFayden, Keris Salmon and Frank Williams, and Robin Wright and Ian Reeves.
Sustained support generously provided by the Halperin Exhibitions Fund and The Lynn Krywick Gibbons Gallery Exhibitions Fund at the Cantor Arts Center.

 

 

Virtual Tour

Click the button below to start the tour. Alternatively, you can click here to go straight to the second gallery or click here to go to the last two galleries in the exhibition. The links will open in new browser tabs.

Past Programs

Day Jobs | Service & Care: Violette Bule, Lenka Clayton, and Jay Lynn Gomez Sun., Mar. 3, 2024, 1:30 p.m., Cantor Auditorium
Watch recorded program Artists represented in Day Jobs addressed the relationship between care and service and how their creative practices have been shaped by their labor as caregivers or service workers in a discussion moderated by Cantor director and exhibition curator Veronica Roberts.

Day Jobs | Sandy Rodriguez: Codex Rodriguez-Mondragón Thurs., Apr. 11, 2024, 6:00 p.m., Cantor Auditorium Watch recorded program Through research of Mexican and pre-Columbian pigments and materials used to make paintings, artist Sandy Rodriguez shares the breadth of her work at the intersection of history, social memory, and contemporary politics.

Beyond Day Jobs: Alternative Economies for Artists
Thurs., May 23, 6:00 p.m. Cantor Auditorium
Watch recorded program
This program will consider different models of supporting artists, covering examples such as redistribution through mutual aid, artist guaranteed income, and universal basic income.
Co-sponsored by Cantor Arts Center, Stanford Basic Income Lab, Center for Poverty and Inequality

In the News

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Catalogue

Available for purchase at Cantor.

A major catalogue functions both as an essential reader for the exhibition and as a standalone compilation of stories by many of the country’s most compelling artists, detailing the impact of their day jobs in their own words. Among the 24 artists who contributed interviews and essays to the book include Larry Bell, Genesis Belanger, Sara Bennett, Mark Bradford, Violette Bule, Jim Campbell, Lenka Clayton, Marsha Cottrell, Jeffrey Gibson, Jay Lynn Gomez, Tishan Hsu, Tom Kiefer, Ahree Lee, Nate Lewis, Robert Mangold, Narsiso Martinez, Allan McCollum, Virginia L. Montgomery, Ragen Moss, Howardena Pindell, Manuel A. Rodríguez Delgado, Sandy Rodriguez, Frank Stella, and Julia Scher.

Published by Santa Fe-based Radius Books, over 300 copies of the catalogue will be distributed to community art centers and public libraries across the country via their Donation Program—further enhancing the educational reach of Day Jobs and its core ethos about how to better support creative practices. The catalogue is edited by Veronica Roberts. Other contributors include Francesca Balboni, Sarah C. Bancroft, Meg Burns, Jenny Dally, Lucy R. Lippard, Lynne Maphies, Aja Edwin Mujinga Sherrard, Kenta Murakami, Rebekah Rutkoff, and Jorge Eduardo Sibaja.

Learn More

 

 

a photograph of a book page
a photograph of a book page

Image: Courtesy Radius Books.

a photograph of a book page

Image: Courtesy Radius Books.

a photograph of a book page

Image: Courtesy Radius Books.

a photograph of a book page

Image: Courtesy Radius Books.

a photograph of a book page

Image: Courtesy Radius Books.

a photograph of a book page

Image: Courtesy Radius Books.

a photograph of a book page

Image: Courtesy Radius Books.

a photograph of a book page

Image: Courtesy Radius Books.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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