Artist
Adam Forrester

Project Title
Devil Town

Discipline
Photography & Moving Images

Grant Amount
$1,490

Website
http://www.adamforrester.com/

Project Description
Part media archive, part traveling exhibition, and part printed tabloid, Devil Town will be a visual and audible representation of the narrative that led to the town of Phenix City, Alabama earning the moniker of “Sin City, USA.”  The project will include archival images, film, and sound footage juxtaposed with Adam Forrester’s own photographic images, digital audio and video clips he is currently producing in and around Phenix City, Alabama and Columbus, Georgia.

Forrester will investigate specific crimes, like the murder of Albert Patterson in 1954, and practices from this somewhat bizarre moment in the history of the small town, which also happens to be the town he was born in. Forrester will revisit 60 - 70 year old crime scenes to see what a notion of progress might look/sound like. He plans to scour the archive collections in both Alabama and Georgia in search of images, sounds, and documents that reveal forgotten truths or support peculiar myths. Forrester, who is also a filmmaker, plans to photograph filming locations and relatives of main characters, from the semi-documentary film noir, The Phenix City Story (1955). Adam is the winner of the 2016 Idea Capital Travel Grant for Research & Development.