Henry Taylor: B Side
Oct 4, 2023–Jan 28, 2024
Portrait of Steve Cannon
7
Over the years, Taylor has depicted many artists, critics, and curators from his community including Andrea Bowers, Deana Lawson, and Robert Pruitt, all of whom have works in the Whitney's collection. However, Taylor's focus on the art world extends beyond those he knows personally. His "covers" of Dawoud Bey's photograph of David Hammons and Gerhard Richter's painting of his daughter are examples of how he invokes a broader art-historical family by reinterpreting the art of others. Taken together, these works form a map of Taylor's social and artistic circles.
Henry Taylor, Hammons meets a hyena on holiday, 2016
Henry Taylor, Hammons meets a hyena on holiday, 2016. Acrylic on canvas, 60 × 84 1/4 in. (152.4 × 214 cm). Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University; museum purchase with additional funds provided by the Blackburn Endowment and Nasher Annual Fund. © Henry Taylor. Courtesy the artist and Hauser & Wirth. Photograph by Joshua White
This painting playfully alters a photograph by Dawoud Bey of the artist David Hammons performing his influential work Bliz-aard Ball Sale (1983). In that work, Hammons took on the role of a New York street vendor, selling a selection of snowballs meticulously organized atop a “North African rug” on the sidewalk in front of him. In 2016, the Whitney Museum commissioned Taylor to create a holiday card. Using Bey’s photograph as a springboard, Taylor pays homage to Hammons by depicting the artist standing in front of the Great Mosque of Djenné in Mali selling snowballs with a hyena looking on. In keeping with the holiday spirit of the commission, Taylor replaces the blazer hanging on the gate in Bey’s photo with a Santa Claus robe and adds a reindeer-pulled sleigh in the painting’s upper left corner.