Kiki Smith
PROJECT
Multidisciplinary artist Kiki Smith is known for her figurative works exploring mortality, abjection, sexuality and the human body. Smith takes inspiration from her childhood, drawing on fairytales, biblical stories and the great myths of creation, particularly the female heroines of these narratives. Within these stories she explores the harmonious coexistence between women and animals, often fusing their bodies together into one being. In Rest upon, a life-sized bronze sculpture of a lamb on top of a sleeping women, Smith explores the relationship between humans and the natural world.
The acquisition of this artist’s work is supported by Paula Fox AC, and Andrew & Judy Rogers
ABOUT
Kiki Smith’s multidisciplinary practice includes sculpture, printmaking, photography, drawing and textiles. Along with contemporaries including Barbara Kruger and Cindy Sherman, Smith is associated with second wave of feminist art in the 1980s, which sought new ways to creatively explore the societal roles of women. Her work has been featured in many major solo exhibitions, including her major 2005 retrospective, Kiki Smith: A Gathering, 1980–2005, which travelled to many institutions throughout North America. Smith has been included in five Venice Biennales, most recently in 2017, and her works are represented in many major American collections, including the Art Institute of Chicago; the National Gallery of Art, Washington; the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; and the Walker Art Centre, Minneapolis. In 2006 Smith was recognised as one of Time magazine’s TIME 100: The People Who Shape Our World. She is an adjunct professor at New York University and Columbia University.