David Hammons

David Hammons is an American artist who has worked in varied styles and media since the 1960s. Hammons moved from Springfield, Illinois to Los Angeles in 1962, where he attended the Chouinard Art Institute (now CalArts) and the Otis Art Institute, at which he took classes with artist and activist Charles White that deeply influenced his taste and future work. In the late 1960s, Hammons began making his early works, entitled Body Prints, which involved covering his body with grease, imprinting it on paper, and covering the result with colored pigments. In 1974, Hammons relocated to New York and began to utilize symbols of African-American life—hair from barbershop floors, empty liquor bottles, chicken bones—to create sculptures that critically engage with what it means to grow up Black in the United States. While Hammons emphasizes his status as a cultural outsider he continues to make work central to the American experience. In 1984, Hammons participated in The Kitchen’s Downtown/Uptown Television Festival, presenting a work in collaboration with Bill T. Jones and Phillip Mallory Jones.