I began this continuing body of works on canvas at the start of quarantine. During these uncertain and tragic times, these paintings became a safe space for me to unravel and evolve my thoughts, fears, joys and anxieties into poetic forms. Each one acts as a re ection of my hand and my mood exploring the gesture that weaves throughout my practice.
The intimacy of this scale enabled me to have a closer, more immediate relationship to these works, which allowed me to with use different ways of drawing and tying, and to experiment with a blindfolded intuitive process to create a group of works including, And, she wept miracles and Spirit Writing. These works are raw energy expressed solely through gesture while others incorporate collage and palm-sized bundles that serve as prayer offerings like Working Loose. – Shinique Smith.
For more than a decade, multimedia artist Shinique Smith has employed clothing, textiles and objects—items that exist in the realm of what we call belongings—to construct sculptures, paintings, and site-specific installations. Examining the ways in which these objects resonate on a personal and social scale, Smith's works operate at the convergence of consumption, displacement, and sanctuary. In Smith's hands, these works reveal connections across space, time, and place to suggest the possibility of constructing worlds renewed by hopeful delight.
Born in Baltimore, MD, currently residing in Los Angeles, California, Smith's art works have been exhibited by and are in the permanent collections of institutions such as, Baltimore Museum of Art, The Barnes Museum, Brooklyn Museum of Art, Bronx Museum, Contemporary Art Center, New Orleans; Denver Art Museum, The Frist Center for Visual Arts, Kemper Museum, Madison Museum of Contemporary Art, Minneapolis Art Institute, MOCA Jacksonville, MOCA North Miami, MOMA PS1, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; The National Portrait Gallery, Washington, DC, The New Museum, The Studio Museum of Harlem and The Whitney Museum among others.
Baik Art represents these artists: