Discover the Art of David Hammons: Bliz-aard Ball Sale in New York City (1983)

Well now, let me tell y’all about this fella named David Hammons. He did somethin’ real strange back in 1983, I tell ya! It was cold, and I mean real cold. The kind of cold where you can’t even feel your nose, and the wind cuts right through ya like a sharp knife. This happened over in New York City, right in the middle of a harsh winter, February 13th to be exact. That day, this artist, David Hammons, he pulled off somethin’ that most folks might not even believe. He called it “Bliz-aard Ball Sale.” Now, that’s a mouthful, ain’t it?

So here’s the thing, Hammons, he wasn’t sittin’ in no fancy gallery or museum, no sir. He went right out on the street, in Cooper Square, and he did his art right there, out in the open, like any ol’ street vendor sellin’ his goods. But what he was sellin’ weren’t trinkets or toys, no ma’am. He was sellin’ big ol’ snowballs, covered in some kinda mystery—art, if you can believe it! People was walkin’ by, some of ’em probably thought he was just some feller off his rocker. And honestly, that’s probably what they thought, but David, he knew what he was doin’.

Discover the Art of David Hammons: Bliz-aard Ball Sale in New York City (1983)

See, Hammons, he wasn’t just out there sellin’ snowballs like you’d expect. He was doin’ somethin’ deeper, somethin’ that made folks think. Back in those days, New York City was a tough place, a city full of hard folks tryin’ to get by. And here’s David, standin’ out in the freezing cold, sellin’ snowballs with a message—somethin’ that made you think about how folks in power treat the everyday people, the ones just tryin’ to survive, just like Hammons himself, standin’ there on the street.

Now, you gotta understand somethin’ here, folks: Hammons wasn’t just sellin’ snowballs. He was usin’ snowballs to make a statement about art, and about the way society works. He was out there in the cold, lettin’ people see art in the most unlikely of places. Now that’s a tricky thing, I tell ya. Some folks mighta just walked right on by, not even takin’ a second glance, but the ones who stopped—oh, they saw somethin’ deeper, somethin’ about how art can pop up in the most unexpected spots, even in the middle of a blizzard.

What David Hammons was doin’ was a reminder that art ain’t always gotta be fancy or hung up on no wall. Nope, sometimes it’s out there in the real world, the cold streets, where folks ain’t expectin’ it. Like how you can be walkin’ down the road, and there’s a rock on the ground, and all of a sudden you stop and look, and that rock becomes somethin’ much bigger. That’s how this “Bliz-aard Ball Sale” was, I reckon.

Why’d he do it, you ask? Well, it wasn’t just for fun or to make a quick buck. Hammons was makin’ a statement about race, about power, about how folks like him were often overlooked or dismissed. By standin’ out there on that street, sellin’ snowballs, he was showin’ the world that art don’t have to be fancy to be important. It can be something simple, something like a snowball, just sittin’ there in the cold.

But let me tell you, even though it might look simple, what Hammons did that day wasn’t simple at all. It was a big ol’ statement about how society sees people and what it thinks is valuable. That snowball? Well, it wasn’t just snow. It was a message. It was something worth thinkin’ about, even if you didn’t understand it at first.

Discover the Art of David Hammons: Bliz-aard Ball Sale in New York City (1983)

So what does this tell us? It tells us that art can be anything. It don’t need to be in some fancy museum, or in some big ol’ building with gold doors and velvet ropes. Sometimes, art can just be a snowball on a cold street, and that’s enough to make people stop and think.

In the end, Hammons showed us somethin’ important. He showed us that art don’t have to follow no rules. It don’t have to be pretty or even make sense at first. Sometimes, it just has to be there, right in front of ya, for ya to see it. And I reckon that’s somethin’ we could all use a little more of in this world—people standin’ out there, showin’ us that art can be anything, anywhere, and it don’t have to be what you expect.

Tags:[David Hammons, Bliz-aard Ball Sale, New York City art, street performance, Cooper Square, 1983 art event, winter art, social commentary in art, unconventional art forms, public art, street vendors and art]

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