Sotheby's locks out unionized art handlers, sparks picket line

[The Northerner]

(Reuters) - Unionized art handlers and fellow Teamsters picketed outside Sotheby's on Tuesday after the auction house locked the workers out last week following a drawn-out contract dispute.

The 43 art handlers, members of Teamsters Local 814 whose contract expired in early July, were told by the auction house on Friday they could not return to their jobs at Sotheby's Manhattan headquarters and had been replaced by temporary workers.

The lockout took hold a month before the start of the critical fall sales, which last season took in hundreds of millions of dollars for Sotheby's and rival Christie's.

Sotheby's said in a statement it had been negotiating "in good faith" since May, and had offered "a contract with attractive terms," which the union rejected.

Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/08/02/us-sothebys-lockout-idUSTRE7715NH20110802?feedType=RSS&feedName=domesticNews&rpc=22&sp=true