Kiki Smith is an American artist who was born in Germany on January 18, 1954. She was born to a sculptor, Tony Smith, and an opera singer, Jane Lawrence. Though born on German soil, her parents moved to New Jersey soon after Kiki’s birth. Kiki grew up assisting her father with his sculptures and also in the Catholic church; while these two things may appear unrelated, both of these aspects of her childhood have a significant impact in her own art and sculpting career.
Materials and Methods
Kiki has experimented with many different types of artistry, and is therefore well versed in the sculpture, printmaking, and traditional drawing. While she mostly sculpts (though in quite a different way from her father), she has done many traditional works.
She also deals with unique, experimental styles. For example, her 1996 installment, Constellation, is created with dozens of glass animals and stars:
Let’s take a closer look:
One of her more popular pieces in the 90’s, My Blue Lake, was created with a printmaking technique called photogravure. This process, to put it simply, includes taking the negative of an image and etching the image into a metal plate.
Inspiration
Kiki draws much of her inspiration from her Catholic upbringing. She theorizes that religion — especially the Catholic church — and art have something in common: the desire to physically manifest something from within the self, whether that be something spiritual or emotional. She also finds that both religion and art are a form of storytelling. Both have tales and convey something that is of significance to the ones who tell the stories. A theme of storytelling often appears in her work, such as these two pieces, Lying with the Wolf and Wearing the Skin.
In many of her pieces, Kiki deals with the idea of the human body and how it relates to the world around it. Her sculptures often portray women and some form of rebirth; take her 2002 Born, for example:
This sculpture leaves little to the imagination. It portrays a woman being born from a gentle doe, its horizontal orientation giving a calming feeling despite being in the presence of the realistically impossible.
, The Women on the Pyres
The Women on the Pyres are a set of sculptures, each depicting a woman kneeling atop a pile of wood. At the time, she was partaking in an outdoor sculpting competition. She felt no inspiration in her work. She had, however, recently been interested in the numerous witch trials in Europe. Hundreds of women were beaten and burned during this dark time, and for any little reason. Even worse, the towns involved still rarely speak of it. This in mind, she set out to commemorate these women, who kneel with their arms stretched out as a parallel to Jesus’ crucifixion. One piece became two, and so the set was developed.
Unlike other art pieces that portray these “witches” screaming in agony and tied to posts, the Women on the Pyres have closed mouths and passive expressions. It’s as if, instead of fighting the inevitable, they are waiting in acceptance. This perhaps relates back to her theme of rebirth in her projects.
Kiki Smith’s works have been displayed in galleries all of the United States, including the Museum of Modern Art in New York and the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles. Now 65 years of age, Kiki resides in New York City.
Works cited
https://art21.org/read/kiki-smith-learning-by-looking-witches-catholicism-and-buddhist-art/
https://art21.org/read/kiki-smith-family-history-and-the-history-of-objects/
https://art21.org/artist/kiki-smith/