Kiki Smith

In her works, Smith describes a “contemporary cosmography” that draws a path of reflection and invites us to dwell on the vulnerability of the human condition with respect to the complexity of life.

Both the bronze and the four works of the Standing series adopt the force of repetition in narratives and symbolic representations.They are inspired by the visual culture of the past, which ranges from anatomical, natural and scientific representations from the 18th century to the abjection of images of relics, memento mori, folklore, mythology, Byzantine iconography, medieval altarpieces and depictions of the animal world. The works thus fit into the current discussion on how the perception of life has changed, and in what terms – also, following the spread of the Covid-19 pandemic – how concepts such as identity, the relationship between the body and the world and between humanity and nature are evolving. The artists says: “We are part of the natural world and our identity is completely linked to our relationship with our habitat and animals”.

Kiki Smith (Nuremberg, Germany, 1954). She lives and works in New York, USA. She has been the protagonist of more than 150 monographic exhibitions around the world and she occupies a prominent place in the panorama of contemporary art. Smith has been the subject of over 25 museum solo exhibitions. Her work has been featured at five Venice Biennales. She is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the Royal Academy of Arts, London. She won the 2010 Nelson A. Rockefeller Award and the 2013 U.S. Department of State Medal of Arts. She is an adjunct professor at NYU and Columbia University.