MIDWEST CANDY
Midwestern cities are enticing because of their affordability at least when compared to coastal cities. However, this advantage comes with a health risk for inhabitants due to constant exposure to environmental pollution produced by big agriculture and industry. Tanmaya Bingham tackles this bittersweet situation in her surreal mixed media on panel series Midwest Candy. Bingham’s advocacy for the welfare of Midwestern residents is illustrated by hierarchical compositions where the subject’s large figure dominates the foreground against a bleak and receding landscape. Each narrative depicts a unique scenario to a different environmental concern, such as a man wearing a radioactive pink fluorescent HAZMAT suit, or the twinkle of gold glitter GMO corn. The subjects are set against a uniform backdrop of a sky that is yellow from contamination, and an earth that is gray from eroded topsoil. Despite the macabre tone of Midwest Candy, Bingham embeds a supernatural phenomenon into the work as if to provide hope that we might transcend beyond this current predicament.