Recipient Information
Location
Birmingham, Alabama
Year of Award
2024
Grant or Fellowship
Southern Prize and State Fellowships
Grant Amount
$5,000
Multi-disciplinary artist Tony M. Bingham lives and works in Birmingham, AL. Bingham received his B.A. in Communications from Antioch College, an MA in Film and Community Media from Goddard College, and an MFA from Georgia State University. Bingham’s research and resulting work explore communities and public space, particularly historic sites of enslaved, extractive, or industrialized labor throughout Alabama. Through his sculptures, large scale photography, found and original audio work, Bingham makes reference to unmarked burial sites, vernacular headstones and various sites which offer opportunities to consider African-American lifeways and ways of memorializing. His art-making practice calls into question where, how, and who we collectively remember. Bingham currently teaches humanities and studio art at Miles College in Fairfield, Alabama.
Artist Statement
Who will speak for my people if not the artist? Who will help those outside of the art dialog to understand the creative potential they possess? I am an African-American artist and professor at Miles College in Birmingham. Using organic, repurposed and cast off materials, I make art that tells the story of my cast-off people.
I use artmaking processes to explore the legacy and spirit of my ancestors. This body of work investigates the history of rural African-American people through themes of spirituality, celebration, trauma and rebirth. Art inspires conversations that lead to physical manifestations of shared ideas and dreams.
“Bearing Witness : Praise House - Sun Shadows” evolved as a project that brought together descendants of the enslaved and descendants of their enslavers. The project collected stories from the descendants of enslaved people who shared memories of their spiritual origins. “Bearing Witness” is a site specific sculpture offering a place of remembrance for both Black and White Wallace descendants at the 1841 Wallace Plantation in Harpersville, Alabama.
A sacred image of a Black family was transformed into steel cut engraving, allowing sunlight and shadow to move within the sculpture.