Like Cher – who also leaves little of her physique to the imagination – there’s an artist in Baltimore who goes by a single name: Ham. The persona, a diminutive of his given name, relates not to a sandwich but how the word is used in the theater, the act of flying over the top to bring attention to one’s self.
Ham’s theater is the public square. In pursuit of art, defending freedom of expression and a craving for publicity, he has taken to posing naked between Manhattan and Baltimore. By the time you read this he will likely have done it several times more, a campaign that is more of a march than a streak. A dramatic turn took place on the Fourth of July in Little Italy when he jumped a fence to climb the high marble pedestal that once held a statue of Christopher Columbus.
“No other time was more appropriate,” he said, referring not just to Independence Day but the sixth anniversary of the toppling of the Columbus statue by anti-colonization protesters. Or vandals, depending on your point of view. A sculpture of an Italian immigrant couple with an infant is expected to take its place late next year.
In a nod to another well-known Italian – Michelangelo, he of a single name and unassailable greatness – the 32-year-old mimicked the sculptor’s David for four hours, from sunrise until about 9:30 AM when the cops showed up. He was arrested, as he assumed he would, and attracted attention, as he hoped he might.
“I thought it would create a nuanced form of freedom, an honest, non-violent display,” he said. “Then I was on the ground in shackles.”
Though uninjured, an ambulance took him to Johns Hopkins Hospital for observation. He was charged remotely with indecent exposure, destruction of property and resisting arrest. His attorney, Chelsey Seger of Towson, said he will plead not guilty at a jury trial that has not yet been scheduled.
“As soon as the handcuffs were on I continued to be a statue, did not move or speak,” he said.
Asked what would be a successful result of exhibiting his loin chops for all to see, Ham was quick to answer, “Stories like this.” As in there’s no such thing as bad publicity, which he hopes will drive traffic to his gallery in the Hollins Market neighborhood and the aspiring artists he wants to promote.
“The purpose of the performances is to be talked about to [increase] the value of my perspective and provide other artists the same opportunity without constraining them financially,” he said. He does not dispute that he was raised in great privilege and continues to benefit from it despite his poor opinion of capitalism. “I’m challenging the fact that you don’t have to be poor and in pain to be an artist.”
Tall, handsome and well-sculpted (he recently joined a boxing gym), Ham’s serious shenanigans have landed him in the papers more than once. The New York Post was particularly nasty, reporting a “deranged stunt” on September 5th in Soho. The paper quoted one woman passing the corner of Crosby and Houston, “I wouldn’t be flaunting that.”
During a previous engagement in New York, he got into an argument with police who held him for a few hours. Never charged, he said the officers apologized while letting him go.
Sometimes he covers his genitals but not always. Now and then, like the early September performance in Manhattan, he appears with messages scrawled on his body: Artist SeeKING Benefactor.
It’s an interesting solicitation from a man who reportedly lives with his parents in horse country north of the city. There, a subdued and contemplative self-portrait of his face – eyes closed, head downward – hangs in a kitchen hallway.
“I’m like a stray cat,” he said. “I go wherever I’m fed.”
His only tattoo is on the fingers of his left hand, one word per digit: “Shut the [expletive] up.” It is, he said, a reminder to rein himself in. A former colleague in the business world said Ham ran his mouth too much and paid for the tattoo at the Bright Side parlor on Light Street.
His stated aim is to foster debate over the limits a free society puts on the right to freedom of expression. So far, his birthday suit has not cast the issue into the national conversation. Behind this constitutional gloss is a desire for fame, a goal he mentioned several times in our conversation at the Black Cat Bakery & Cafe near his gallery.
It struck me that Ham, for all of his drive, candor and intelligence, isn’t aware of the price stardom exacts. Or perhaps believes that he will be the exceptional person who is neither swallowed whole by it or slowly ground into dust in its pursuit.
After our interview – and many follow-ups by text – I came across this quote from the social critic Irving Howe (1920-1993) about his fellow New York “intellectuals” with whom he engaged in the 1930s.
Of his fellow strivers in arts and letters, Howe wrote that they enjoyed a good argument and sought self-consciously to be “brilliant,” with emphasis on self-conscious, a synonym for insecure.
“Can I be a famous artist and have a normal life? I haven’t found out yet, ” Ham said, noting that he left the upper tiers of the business and philanthropy worlds to which he was born several years ago.
“When I was at Dartmouth around 2016 I took [Psilocybin] ‘shrooms and when I was coming down I decided to become an artist,” he said of a hallucinatory experience not uncommon to would-be artists.
Ham graduated from the Ivy League school in New Hampshire (current tuition $65,500) with a double degree in engineering and studio art with a minor in German. The college’s motto: A voice crying out in the wilderness.
Six years ago, while working as a constrution manager for one of Baltimore’s elite developers, he made the leap into the vague and fickle world of come-what-may. In the tough arena of art, good friends and family will often buy a piece of work as a show of support. And sometimes a benefactor will bail you out of a jam.
After his Fourth of July performance, Ham presented a check for $5,000 to the Italian American Unity Organization for damage done to the iron fence protecting the empty Columbus pedestal. The fire department cut the hinges to get a cherry picker close enough for police to get him down. The check was not written against Ham’s finances and he would not say on whose account it was drawn.
“I gave it in lieu of them not pressing charges,” said Ham. The damage was repaired for about $1,000 according to the local company which did the work. The check has not been cashed because the fiduciary of the Italian-American organization – William Martin of Towson – died on September 16.
On the other side of his trial, a formal platform from which to defend freedom of speech, Ham intends to do another self portrait, perhaps full-length.
“I can assure you it will not be flattering,” he said. “I have a lot of [stuff] to confront that I’ve been ignoring. I’m not happy with where I am personally.”
Thus the spurned engagement ring he wears on a chain around his neck. He claims that art has saved his life. From what he didn’t say.
Rafael Alvarez has been writing about Baltimore eccentrics – from Miss Bonnie who ran an Elvis Bar on Fleet Street to a heroic swimmer who lived in an old ice cream truck in Ocean City – since the early days of the now defunct City Paper. He can be reached via orlo.leini@gmail.com.
