Today we’d like to introduce you to Shawn Smith.
Shawn, we’d love to hear your story and how you got to where you are today both personally and as an artist.
I was born in Dallas. I went to Booker T. Washington High School for the Performing and Visual Arts (Arts Magnet for short or BTWHSPVA if you want to be technical). There I was exposed to a wide variety of mediums and disciplines. I found myself gravitating towards sculpture and printmaking. After high school, I went to Brookhaven College then finished my BFA in 1995 at Washington University in St. Louis. While at Wash U. I studied printmaking with Peter Marcus and Joan Hall. The thing I loved about the program at Wash. U. was how open it was. Yes, it was printmaking but, I found myself mixing sculpture, drawing, printmaking, and installation art in large scale works. After I received my degree, I lived in Paris, France for several months.
With my future wife, I shared a very small apartment with a studio, in the 4th arrondissement. I was making large physical drawings from found paper that was stitched together. After Paris, we made our way to San Francisco, CA. After about 10 years in the Bay Area, I attended the California College of the Arts for an MFA in sculpture. I went into graduate school making sculptural objects out of books. While in grad school, I migrated from using books as sculpture to my current work making objects out of pixels. I guess I have been shaping objects with information for quite a while. A few years after receiving my MFA, my wife and I moved to Austin, TX where we live now.
We’d love to hear more about your art. What do you do you do and why and what do you hope others will take away from your work?
My work investigates the slippery intersection between the digital world and reality. Specifically, I am interested in how we experience nature through technology. I grew up in a large city only experiencing the natural world through computers and television screens. With my work, I create three-dimensional sculptural representations of two-dimensional images of nature I find online. I build my objects pixel by pixel with hand-cut, hand-dyed strips of wood in an overtly laborious process in direct contrast to the slipperiness and speed of the digital world. Through this process of pixilation, details become distilled, distorted, or deleted. I am interested in how each pixel plays an important role in the identity of the object, the same way each cell plays a crucial role in the identity of an organism.
In addition, my art examines the translation of the natural world from the “real” into a digital format and is then re-translated from the digital back into an object to be decoded and re-introduced into culture. I do feel like there are some additional themes an inspiration that filter into the work: Anthropocene, alienation, the Post Digital, video game culture, natural science, the speed of the digital vs the speed of the real, and the changing relationship of the human and the thing.
I typically work with natural subjects I find on-line. Generally, I choose a subject based on some type of conceptual formula that is developed from readings, films, or ideas I have developed. I particularly like subjects I have not experienced first-hand. I make several drawings of my subject on graph paper – front view, side view, etc. similar to old school architectural drawings. I call these maps. From here I start cutting my material. Next, I start the coloring process where I hand dye each piece ending up with hundreds of colors per sculpture. I refer to my “map” as a guide for building. I stick to the “map” about 80% because I noticed that if I don’t make some spontaneous decisions as I build, the piece sometimes feel stagnant and less lively.
I think humanness plays a big part in my work. I use a lot of natural subjects to examine the distance and loss of the natural world but also use it as a mirror to indirectly reflect the human condition since we have become so immersed in the digital abyss.
I am interested in how the interactions with nature that were so important to us as a species has dramatically declined. We experience the natural world more and more from behind a screen of digital projection. I believe we have developed this perspective that humans are separate from natural world -almost purely observers. But, I believe we are a product of the natural world and our existence cannot be divorced from nature. “This aspect of animated nature, in which man is nothing, has something in it strange and sad…. Here, in a fertile country, adorned with eternal verdure, we seek in vain the traces of the power of man; we seem to be transported into a world different from that which gave us birth.” – Alexander von Humbolt
How can artists connect with other artists?
I think most artists spend incredible amounts of time in the studio – thinking and working. It is hard to have a social circle. For some, having their studio near a group of other working artists can be very helpful to share ideas, borrow tools/supplies, and to simply just talk about the world. However, if you are like me and your studio is in your home, having someone nearby to share ideas with might be very scarce. I am SO very fortunate that my wife and I love to talk about ideas and art. If I want to try and talk to other artists, I typically engage with them at openings (when I can make it), correspond through social media/email, and sometimes a good old phone call to say “Hi – what do you think of this??” goes a long way.
One thing I have done in the past (but is hard to organize) is to have a group of artists over for dinner – we all have to eat. Everybody brings something so it is less expensive and everyone has at least one thing they will eat. I think the trick is to make it feel like no one has to stay until late. Let there be an understanding that if you need to get back to the studio and work, that it is OK to do so.
Do you have any events or exhibitions coming up? Where would one go to see more of your work? How can people support you and your artwork?
I show with 3 galleries at the moment –
Craighead Green Gallery – Dallas, TX – http://www.craigheadgreen.com/
Turner Carrol Gallery – Santa Fe, NM – turnercarrollgallery.com
Galerie Mark Hachem – Paris, France – http://www.markhachem.com/artists.php
I have shown throughout the US and Europe at various art spaces and museums.
Here is a link to my vitae from my website for more details – http://www.shawnsmithart.com/cv.html.
People can support my work by purchasing works from one of my galleries, curating my work into shows, commissioning my work for individual homes, museums, and/or corporate collections, attending my openings, following me on social media, writing articles about my work, including me in publications, and engaging me and my work with a thoughtful dialog.
Contact Info:
- Website: shawnsmithart.com
- Email: shawn@shawnsmithart.com
- Instagram: @shawnsmithsculpture
Image Credit:
All photos by Ann Berman
Getting in touch: VoyageHouston is built on recommendations from the community; it’s how we uncover hidden gems, so if you know someone who deserves recognition please let us know here.
