"The Immense Immorality of Finding a Way to Legitimately Hang People:" Charles Gaines’s New Sculpture, Hanging Tree, Now at Freedom Monument Sculpture Park

From [HERE] Acclaimed conceptual artist Charles Gaines came to Montgomery, Alabama, on October 17 to speak about Hanging Tree, his new work commissioned by EJI for Freedom Monument Sculpture Park. Mr. Gaines’s talk was part of an exciting program of events celebrating the opening of Elevation Convening Center and Hotel.

Mr. Gaines reflected on his upbringing in the Jim Crow South—remembering when his mother dragged him to the back of a bus after he tried to sit in the front and what it was like using the entrance for Black people at the Charleston Zoo—and how it inspires his work to this day.

“In Charleston [there was] this general tenor that you’re living in a place where people don’t like you. And I couldn’t understand that…I think [that] eventually helped shape what I was interested in terms of being an artist.”

Mr. Gaines’s desire to find a way out of living in a highly racialized society motivated him to use his art to “unpack ideological constructs that rule our lives.” His work has evolved as he continues to explore how best to make art that is personally meaningful.

The piece Mr. Gaines created for Freedom Monument Sculpture Park is site specific, he explained—designed to be “in correspondence with the other works in the park, and also with the general idea of the Museum.”

The “hauntingness of the space, of the environment, of this place,” Mr. Gaines said, “created this compelling idea of the importance of place.” His art draws from the power of place, he explained, because it “compels the reality of the narrative aspect of the work.”

Mr. Gaines described Hanging Tree as “a simple structure where I take a tree, turn it upside down, and hang it from a stanchion.” The tree is engineered to gently swing on a motor. [MORE]