Can you critique an artwork as you might an entire city? In El Hadji Sy’s multiform practice, where does one end and the other begin? “I am a pure product of Dakar,” he once declared, and his to-date largest gallery exhibition held in his hometown begged the question, Which Dakar and, moreover, which heritage is he claiming? The gallery occupies a centrally located, late–Art Deco building from 1953, a onetime department store whose former splendor and colonial legacy remain palpable. Entering via a grand marble spiral staircase, viewers encountered banner-like paintings—flowing from the ceiling—that