East Dallas neighbor Richard Sharum is a street photographer, and he’s demanding Dallas’ attention with his outdoor photo exhibit, which is really more of a social experiment than anything. For the exhibit Sharum printed out several large photos of downtown Dallas on paper with adhesive backing, and then stuck them on sidewalks in downtown Dallas, in the exact locations where the photos were taken. He then hid to observe how people interacted with the photos, and even filmed their responses. As he expected, the photos barely made it a few hours; people either stole them or city officials disposed of them. But before that, passersby stopped to study the photos or snap cellphone pictures of them. The photos caused some strangers to chat with each other. Other people asked their friends to take pictures of them lying on the ground beside the artwork. Sharum’s name was nowhere on the photos, only the tag #ObserveDallas. Then he launched #ObserveDallas2015, for which he printed out massive 40-by-60-foot banners and hung them on buildings downtown. He spent almost $100,000 on the project and has recouped only about $10,000. You don’t have to be a math person to know a $90,000 deficit is a number worthy of cold sweat and nervous hives. So what gives? Why’d he do it?
You started this project in East Dallas?
Yeah, I’ve lived over here since fall of 2009. Whenever I first started experimenting with what types of materials to put on the ground, my first idea was to make metal prints. So I was putting metal prints all over East Dallas — kind of like Easter eggs — behind buildings and stuff, testing them to see how long they would hold up in weather. I did that for months before I did the first downtown project.
The prints you stuck on the ground in downtown Dallas were pretty big. How big were the ones you hid around East Dallas?
They were just little metal prints [about postcard size]. I wanted to see what was the best way to adhere them to surfaces. I tried them on different surfaces — concrete, pebblestone, brick. I saw which adhesives worked better, and I waited for sun and rain to see if it would fade the image, how long it would last. I was just experimenting with it. There are a couple of buildings around here that still have prints behind them that no one knows about.
Really? Where?
I live on Lake Gardens, so right around there [near Goodfriend Beer Garden and Good 2 Go Taco]. That’s where I started, but I eventually scrapped the metal idea because I didn’t want to piss buildings off by using concrete adhesive to where they’d have to go yank them off. So I ended up using Epson adhesive paper, which is really nice. It prints museum quality. It looks like you could hang it on the wall.
What did you learn from the experiment downtown with the adhesive paper?
Within two or three hours, they were all taken. Seven of the eight were taken by passersby and one of the prints was taken by the city — the last one. But it’s interesting because they were talking about it. They were confused about whether or not they should take it, if it was trash.
The way people interacted with it just confirmed my theory that people are starving for that kind of random act of expression, that interactivity. In downtown, they’re not used to seeing that. You had all these strangers who otherwise probably never would have talked to each other talking. It was cool to see my work affecting people like that. So I decided to go ahead and do #ObserveDallas2015 bigger and better, and put it on the side of buildings.
With the second phase of the downtown project, the one with the huge prints hanging from buildings, what was your vision?
I only put up images that were shot in downtown. It’s a celebration of life here in Dallas. The one that has caught the most, I guess, controversial attention is the one that went up on Ervay across from City Hall. It’s of a homeless man.
You’re an internationally recognized photographer, so why do this experiment in Dallas?
I’ve shot downtowns internationally. #ObserveDallas is kind of a part of a bigger project I have going on. I started shooting downtown areas back in 2005, specifically documenting downtown areas and the people who use them. I’ve shot in Brazil, Italy, England, all over the U.S. I wanted to do this in Dallas instead of in other downtowns where I’m more known because I think Dallas has a bad problem of holding people back.
How so?
I’ve known people who have to go to other cities to be recognized because no one cares about them in Dallas, and then they come back to Dallas and suddenly Dallas wants to claim them. I see some really smart creative people in Dallas who aren’t given any attention. I’ve been all over and met some really great artists, and the reason Dallas isn’t on par with these other cities is because all of the people who are trying to do something different in Dallas are being held back.
I went to New York and Chicago and Italy, and my work was recognized. I was recognized by Magnum Photos. And then I come back to Dallas like, ‘Hey I’ve got some work I want to show,’ and it’s like, ‘Well, we’re not interested in seeing your work.’ ‘Oh, but did I mention I was awarded the Magnum Masterclass three times in 2014?’ And suddenly it’s, ‘Oh you were? Well, let’s talk then.’ I’m like, ‘Why? My work didn’t change. It’s the same work I just showed you.’ I think it’s a citywide problem.
I wanted this project to be a shot across the bow to arts writers, the city government and everybody, to put up this huge art, so that hopefully the public will think ‘Finally someone is doing something like this’ and start demanding more things like it.
