Nightcleaners Film Screening

'Nightcleaners' (1975) is a documentary film about the campaign to unionise the women who cleaned office blocks at night and who were being victimised and underpaid by their employers.

It was made by members of the Berwick Street Film Collective (Marc Karlin, Mary Kelly, James Scott and Humphry Trevelyan), who originally intended to make a campaign film but instead were forced to turn to new forms of filmmaking in order to represent the forces at work between the cleaners, the Cleaner's Action Group and the unions – and the complex nature of the campaign itself.

The result was an intensely self-reflexive film, which implicated both the filmmakers and the audience in the processes of precarious, invisible labour. It is increasingly recognised as a key work of the 1970s and as an important precursor, in both subject matter and form, to current political art practice.

The film will be screened at Little Theatre. Spaces are limited, to reserve a spot please register below:

Free screening registration link:
https://www.eventbrite.co.nz/e/the-nightcleaners-film-screening-tickets-63842071354
(Running time: 90 minutes)

Preview a short extract here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eWJJ_D3Be8U

This free screening of 'Nightcleaners' by Berwick Street Film Collective is part of the public programmes for the exhibition The Future of Work.

This work is from the LUX collection.