Spina Americana

In Spina Americana (American Spine in Latin), Sharum attempts to determine what the people, and their land,
of the Central US have to do with contributing towards what he considers to be the ’national character’ of the US.

In this current political climate, where seclusion and division have gained the upper hand in the national psyche, it is Sharum’s aim to find the unifying elements not only as Americans, but as a people.

He wanted
to see if this region could hold the key to other Americans having a better understanding of who America is as a country and what remains of the collective hope they still have as a nation. Sharum felt this could only be accomplished using a spectrum of long-term documentation, highlighting the overall complexity
of what is generally assumed about this area.

Richard Sharum is a documentary photographer based in the Dallas, Texas area whose work focuses on socio-economic or social justice dilemmas. His work has been exhibited in Kyoto, Japan; Sao Paulo, Brazil; Reggio Emilia, Italy; New York, and Dallas, US and is held in both private and public collections. He has been commissioned by The Meadows Foundation, Harvard Law School, Children’s Cancer Fund, Notre Dame School, and Family Gateway, amongst others. His photographs have been featured in numerous publications including The Atlantic, Texas Monthly, The New York Times Lens Blog, PATRON, The International Business Times, Glasstire, and Spacing Toronto Magazine. In 2015 and 2016, he initiated the Observe Dallas Project, an outdoor exhibition which served as a catalyst for a city-wide conversation on the homeless population, and for which he was awarded the Cultural Projects Grant. He was a finalist for the ICP / GOST First Photo Book Award in 2019 and became a XXXII Eddie Adams Alumnus in upstate New York.