| Description | Workers! is a film by artist and filmmaker Petra Bauer and sex-worker led organisation SCOT-PEP. It was filmed in the Scottish Trade Union Congress (STUC) in Glasgow, a building rooted in workers’ struggles for rights and political representation. During SCOT-PEP’s one-day occupation of the STUC, conversations unfolded that centred the voices of sex workers demanding to be seen as experts on their own work and lives.
Regular workshops held over three years supported the process of making the film, and the group shared their daily experiences of work, political organising, and the structural challenges faced when trying to change the conditions for sex workers in Scotland. Through an ongoing process of listening and sharing ideas, Petra and SCOT-PEP were guided by the questions: how do you act politically when stigma prevents you from being public? How do you create new images of sex workers organising without revealing the identity of those involved? What is regarded as work and who has the right to work? How has (women’s) work been represented historically and what new strategies can be used for filmmaking today?
This collective approach is inspired by feminist film practitioners who emphasise making films with their subjects, not about them. Two historic films are used as a starting point for the new film: Les Prostituées de Lyon Parlent (1975) by Carole Roussopoulous and collective Vidéo Out, that documents the occupation of a church by two hundred sex workers denouncing police harassment and dangerous working conditions; and Chantal Akerman’s iconic Jeanne Dielman, 23 Quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles (1975), which depicts the daily routine of Jeanne as a mother, housewife and sex worker.
SCOT-PEP is a sex-worker led charity that advocates for the safety, rights and health of everyone who sells sex in Scotland. They believe that sex work is work, and that sex workers deserve protections such as labour rights. Along with Amnesty International, the World Health Organization and the Global Alliance Against Traffic in Women, they believe that the decriminalisation of sex work best upholds the safety and rights of people who sell sex. |
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