The first iteration of this project occurred in 2019 at Sweet Pass Sculpture Park, Dallas, TX, as part of a show called Bush League, which celebrated the American institution of Baseball. Baseballs were mime-signed from a list of names selected by artist Hills Snyder and mailed to the curators (Lindsay Starr & Daedalus Hoffmann) to be scattered in the park and left for random attendees and passers-by.

Twenty-Four Balls and The Truth, for San Antonio, will be enacted during a one-week pop-up residency at Casa Chuck by Snyder, September 12 through 18, 2023.

Twenty-four faux-leather baseballs will be signed with the following names and pitched onto baseball diamonds in San Antonio: Angelo Baca, Jorge Luis Borges, Jenny Browne, Hernan Diaz, Emily Dickinson, The Dude, Dock Ellis, Joey Fauerso, Jeffrey Gibson, Joy Harjo, Blind Lemon Jefferson, Flaco Jiménez, Colin Kaepernick, Edna St. Vincent Millay, Gregg Popovich, Parker Posey, Rupert Pupkin, Ishmael Reed, Joe Reyes, Sally Ride, Scarlet Rivera, John Trudell, Doug Sahm, R.G. Vliet.  

Random or intentional discoverers of the balls may be curious enough to look up the “autograph” on the ball, expanding their field of knowledge; may merely collect the balls; or may leave them where they are found, pretty much miming what goes on with any work of art: meaning, whether subjective or universal, is left to wind its’ way in a complex world.

The title of the project riffs on the 1950s phrase coined by Harlan Howard, “three chords and the truth,” in reference to the I, IV, and V chords along with lyrical honesty, that are foundational in song writing — a timeless human activity that happens world-wide twenty-four hours a day.

The venture will be documented with photographs, including those featuring the twenty-four balls in place on their respective fields, and one photograph of left-field grass sans baseball. One of the twenty-four balls will be left on a closed or abandoned field. 

Beginning Wednesday, September 13, six balls per day will be pitched, with daily social media updates (Instagram and Facebook) on the project. The photos will be collected in a notebook that may be perused at a public gathering at Casa Chuck on Saturday, September 16, 6 to 9 PM.