One Life: Dolores Huerta
Dolores Huerta
Barbara Carrasco (born 1955)
1999 Silkscreen, 78.7 × 61cm (31 × 24″)
National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution, © 1999 Barbara Carrasco
The story of the modern agricultural workers’ movement in the United States is deeply intertwined with that of Dolores Huerta, a Latina leader who worked tirelessly on behalf of farm workers. Beginning July 3, the National Portrait Gallery will highlight her significant role in this movement of the 1960s and 1970s through the exhibition “One Life: Dolores Huerta.”
This 11th installment in the Portrait Gallery’s “One Life” series is the first devoted to a Latina. It will illuminate Huerta as the co-founder, with Cesar Chavez, of the United Farm Workers and her position as the union’s lobbyist and contract negotiator. She was instrumental in achieving major legal protections and a better standard of living for farm workers. The exhibition will coincide with the 50th anniversary of the September 1965 Delano grape strike launched by the farm workers’ movement.
Huerta’s confrontational style at the table negotiating contracts and her sincere commitment to social justice earned her the name La pasionaria, or “the passionate one.” At a time when organized labor was dominated by males, and Mexican American women were expected to dedicate themselves to family, Huerta advanced new models of womanhood, all while rearing 11 children. Huerta’s work for the union was far-reaching, encompassing the farm field, the picket line, the legislature and the bargaining table.
Huerta is the second living figure in the “One Life” series. In 1998, President Bill Clinton awarded her with the Eleanor Roosevelt Award for Human Rights. In 2012, President Barack Obama presented her with the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
Curated by Taína Caragol, the museum’s curator of Latino art and history, “One Life: Dolores Huerta” will focus on the years 1962–75, marking the beginnings of Huerta’s activism with Cesar Chavez, the founding of the National Farm Workers Association, and the passage of the California Agricultural Labor Relations Act of 1975. It will feature more than 40 objects, including documentary photographs, original speeches presented by her to Congress, UFW ephemera and Chicano artworks.
Huerta is the second living figure in the “One Life” series. In 1998, President Bill Clinton awarded her with the Eleanor Roosevelt Award for Human Rights. In 2012, President Barack Obama presented her with the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
Learn more about the history of migrant farm workers from Mexico: Bittersweet Harvest: The Bracero Program 1942 – 1964
Bracero farm workers using short-handled hoes in a field. Many growers thought short-handled hoes made workers more careful and kept crops from being damaged. Workers despised the short-handled hoe because it forced them to stoop over to work, causing back injuries resulting from the constant strain of bending over all day. Since no machine has been able to replace stoop labor, it continues today. (Photo by Leonard Nadel)
Related posts:
Posted: 29 May 2015
