ARTIST SPOTLIGHT: January 2024

David Bacon has been involved in social activist work for most of his life, documenting labor history and using those stories to inspire change. He is a photographer and writer who uses the two mediums together connecting the oral histories of individuals and families with visuals illustrating the issues they have to deal with in their daily lives. David’s inspiration to create artwork is based on social justice with a deep interest in expressing the social reality of working people and what they face and have faced in life. Most of David’s work has been done in the United States but he has also gone to other countries including Mexico, Philippines, and Central America on his artistic  journey. The main topics related to the documentation and representation of the populations he works with focus on things like migration and  labor, the impact of, of war, and civil rights.

David has shown his work extensively at many galleries, museums and libraries, and in  Riverside, he has had the opportunity to show his work at the Riverside Art Museum and now at the Civil Rights Institute. David’s photographic work is part of an art card at Stanford University; the special collections of the Green Library at Stanford now has all of my  photographic work. His work has also been shown at the National Museum in Mexico City, at universities everywhere from the University of Nebraska to Stanford and University of California. Additionally, David has had 7 books published with his work, 3 of which primarily showcase his photographic work.

David uses his artistic endeavors to satisfy a personal creative impulse, but it also allows him to  participate in the lives of the people that he is documenting. It also helps to strengthen the causes of social justice that he is very committed to, and it is a means of communication with people that he values a lot. David stated that “communication happens through words, it  happens through images, it happens through talking to people like you when we have a chance to put that work out in public. It's a way of interacting with people.”  

 For more information, visit David on IG  @dbacon1959 or http://dbacon.igc.org/