Artforum, December 2006

BEST OF 2006: "DAVID HAMMONS: THE UNAUTHORIZED RETROSPECTIVE"

By Okwui Enwezor

Hammons is legendary for his style of public refusal, reticence, and shallow distance from conventional art-world celebration. One might view this absence as a carefully staged form of visibility, understanding Hammons' stance as its own performance, a form of asceticism that stokes an ever-greater desire for his rare exhibitions. The recent "retrospective" of his work at Triple Candie provided a case in point: when Hammons declined an invitation to show at the nonprofit space, the directors went ahead and held a Hammons show anyway, making photocopy bootlegs of his work. Compare this to his appearance two years ago in the Dak'Art Biennale of Cotemporary African Art (in a section curated by Salah M. Hassan and Cheryl Finley) His weeklong sheep raffle, accompanied by music and dancing in the streets of Dakar, proved a radical mastery of public space and social reciprocity. Tombola du Mouton was easily one of the most memorial works of contemporary art I have witnessed.