Memory of a tiptoe, an excavation, expansion cement, stolen doorstop, reproduction glass, graphite crucible, paraffin wax, accidental steps, shared machine part, tree pruning sealer, memory of an unfair necessary, corning wax bite, Maple, tack cloths, the positive of language, packing foam, binder clips, unfired porcelain, handmade lead tubing, a paperweight, granite dust from a monument making shop in Queens, fine bone china rims, when all the color goes away, rubber cast of how to move in 1939, lined paper tray, gift wrap tape, an earring back, dinner plate fragment, silver approximating thread, compressed pewter, the insides of jingle bells, unfired porcelain with dye transfer, Plexiglas, a small city on quick wood, fragment of a glass crucible from Kokomo, IN, fragment of a glass kiln from Kokomo, IN, sinking pewter, Friendly Plastic, Quick Copper, all about timing, bb’s, muslin, half a bouncy ball, a pin back standing in for “seeing the future,” Memory Foam, Aqua Resin, marble dust, red cleaning camouflage, chunk glass, potluck stone, Birch plywood, brads, Super Paint, middle gray, 2016, mixed media installation. Courtesy the artist.
Barb Smith is interested in the lineages of the things we keep, how the hopes and traumas they hold far outweigh any remaining functionality they may retain over the years. The artist’s handmade or elaborately modified found objects are fasteners for memories, with the language describing their construction intuitively and humorously entangled with their final form. For example, in applying a literal approach to the concept of memory foam—which is made to adapt to the human form and then spring back to its original shape—Smith has frozen the impression, or memory of her presence, by soaking the foam in resin and applying pressure as it hardens.
For Queens International 2016, Smith was influenced in part by memorabilia from the 1939-40 and 1964-65 World’s Fair on display on the Museum’s second floor. These souvenir items, like Smith’s objects, contain both residual personal memories and signifiers of a larger social history. Uncannily akin to the way a scale model of a neighborhood or site would instigate the viewer, Smith’s work becomes a miniaturized and imaginary world that highlights the tension between seeing, touching, and recalling. Her incorporation of the slightest curve or swell in the construction of the multi-tiered platform also becomes a perceptual trick, a parallax error, that changes according to the position of the viewer. The peculiar interactions among Smith’s objects and their relationship to the body prompt the viewer to navigate and locate themselves within the platform through processes of association, recognition, affect, and puzzlement.
Barb Smith received an MFA in Sculpture from Bard College (2016) and a BA from Purdue University (2003). Solo exhibitions include Unexpired Time at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Mesa, AZ (2012) and Apperception at Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN (2005). She has been included in group exhibitions at Páramo Gallery, Zona Maco, Mexico City, Mexico (2016), Vox Populi, Philadelphia, PA (2015), A.I.R. Gallery, Brooklyn, NY (2012), Bellevue Arts Museum, Bellevue, WA (2012), The School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, IL (2010),and CoCA Seattle, Seattle, WA (2005). Smith was awarded a New York Foundation for the Arts Fellowship in Sculpture (2011) and attended the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture (2012). Her writing has been featured in The Shawangunk Review, No Dear Magazine, The Saint Lucy, Mahkzin, and The Brooklyn Rail.