“Mise en Place” by Sophia del Rio
Positive Space Tulsa
through October 25
If you’re a restaurant worker, or if you know a restaurant worker, or if you eat at restaurants, run over to Positive Space Tulsa this week and spend some time with “Mise en Place.” The gallery’s current show, which closes on Saturday, is a pointed and moving reflection on the restaurant industry: its contradictions, its abuses, and the value of the people who make, serve, and clean up what you eat and drink.
Packed with conceptual rigor, dark humor, and skillful imagery, this is art grounded in activism. “Mise en Place” comes from the restaurant experience of artist Sophia del Rio, who moved from Washington, D.C. to the Fort Worth area during the height of the pandemic. Texas was open for business, she said in a talk at the show’s opening, and she needed work. “I had not worked in the restaurant industry in maybe like 10 years at that point,” she said. “But it was the easiest job to just walk into. You can walk in and if you're an able-bodied person who can sell something, you can start work that day.”
What she found in the many restaurants she worked in during that time disturbed her. Restaurant owners regularly surveilled employees with cameras and sound recording equipment installed in dining rooms, walk-in freezers, and hallways. They relied on tips to pay their workers; tip pooling was a common practice. Del Rio observed wage theft, time theft, and human trafficking. “And of course,” she said, “if you can't work that double and you're too tired, well, your supervisor will go ahead and give you that bump of cocaine to keep you on your feet and working.”