David Hammons

David Hammons, Untitled  1975

David Hammons, Blue Angels (Penises)  c.1970

David Hammons, Untitled (from Fantasy in Flight Series)  1995

David Hammons, Phat Free  1995, 1999

This work is a short colour video of a man kicking a metal bucket through the streets of a city at night. At the beginning of the film the screen is blank and a series of loud, metallic sounds can be heard playing in an intermittent rhythm. The screen remains blank for most of the first half of the film, with the metallic tones continuing and street sounds – including distant voices and traffic noises – progressively rising in the background. Footage then begins that shows a man from behind kicking a bucket along a street, revealing this to be the cause of the metallic noises. His surroundings are relatively empty, although some cars can be seen. Street lights give the footage a strong orange glow and it is shot in low resolution, making it difficult to discern many details in the scene. The man is wearing dark, baggy clothes and his face is never presented clearly, and although in most of the shots his full form is shown with the street scene around him, at some points the camera focuses on his feet as if seen from above. The man walks along the pavement, occasionally crossing roads, and the film ends with him kicking the bucket up into the air, catching it in his hands and then walking out of shot.