BIRMINGHAM, AL.- The Birmingham Museum of Art presents Wall to Wall: Christopher Myers, the fifth installment of the Museum’s ongoing Wall to Wall series. Created specifically for the BMA, the monumental installation, The Slow Can Beat the Quick, by New York-based artist and writer Christopher Myers transforms the Museum’s lobby with a work inspired by Birmingham’s histories of steel, labor, and land.

“With the first textile installation commissioned for Wall to Wall, Christopher Myers demonstrates how textiles can hold history, memory, and identity, and his work transforms the Museum's main lobby into a space that is monumental but also intimate, and deeply connected to Birmingham's past and present,” says Jade Powers, Hugh Kaul Curator of Contemporary Art.

Grounded in storytelling, Myers’s multidisciplinary practice explores the space between history and mythology through textiles, sculpture, performance, and film. For his new commission, he considers the body as a symbol of labor, drawing from the mythology of Vulcan, the Roman god of the forge, and the golem, a figure long associated with protection and creation. Myers also engages Donna Haraway’s A Cyborg Manifesto, particularly its examination of the ways women’s bodies have historically been intertwined with systems of labor.

The resulting large-scale textile installation reflects on the intertwined histories of cotton and steel, industries that have profoundly shaped Birmingham and the American South. Through these layered references, Myers invites visitors to consider how labor, industry, mythology, and the land continue to inform contemporary understandings of identity and place.

Born in New York City, Christopher Myers creates narratives that bridge history, mythology, and global traditions of making. His collaborative practice has brought him together with shadow puppet makers in Jogjakarta, silversmiths in Khartoum, conceptual video artists in Ho Chi Minh City, musicians in New Orleans, woodcarvers in Accra, weavers in Luxor, metalworkers in Kenya, and textile printers in Copenhagen. Across media and continents, Myers explores how globalization, craft, and storytelling shape both individual and collective identity.

The Wall to Wall series invites artists to activate the Birmingham Museum of Art’s lobby with original, site-specific installations inspired by the city. Recognizing the lobby as a place of gathering and exchange, the series creates immersive experiences that welcome visitors and extend the Museum’s commitment to presenting ambitious contemporary art.

To celebrate the opening of the installation, the Museum will host an Artist Talk with Christopher Myers on Thursday, August 13. The evening begins with a reception from 5 to 6 p.m., followed by the artist talk from 6 to 7 p.m. Myers will discuss the research, ideas, and creative process behind the commission, offering visitors an opportunity to learn more about the histories, myths, and themes that informed the work.