Hawkins Bolden Site, Memphis, TN
The Site
During the last forty years of his life, Hawkins Bolden created and repeatedly reworked an installation of figural assemblages and mask-like forms in and around the yard of his small house in central Memphis.
His humanized forms were made from materials he salvaged from the streets of Memphis, primarily plastic milk bottles, tin cans, hubcaps, teapots, saucepans, and toys. Most of the works have eyes–crudely slashed holes–while others have tongues made from shoe soles, hoses, and pieces of carpet. Some are self-portraits. A hairy growth on Bolden’s face near his mouth is represented on some of the faces he makes, often made of artificial Christmas tree pine needles. The hundreds of sculptures that lined his fence and filled his garden were often referred to as “scarecrows,” though there is no indication that their primary purpose was to protect his crops.
After his death, the site was dismantled and the works dispersed. In 2010, Kohler Foundation, Inc., gifted ten of Bolden’s works to the John Michael Kohler Arts Center collection.
Hawkins Bolden
1914–2005
Hawkins Bolden and his identical twin, Monroe, were born September 10, 1914, in Memphis, Tennessee. Although blinded by an accident as a boy, Bolden dedicated much of his life to art making.
Perhaps influenced by a childhood spent planting and tending the family garden, adult Bolden made scarecrows and hung these creations along the fence lining the periphery of his garden.
To earn a living, Bolden tended his neighbors’ lawns, cleaned the streets, and picked up discarded objects and other litter from vacant lots, all of which informed his artistic practice.
Bolden died in 2005.
