David Smith: Cubes and Anarchy

David Smith (1906–1965) is widely heralded as the greatest American sculptor of the twentieth century. Smith has generally been presented as the three-dimensional counterpart to the Abstract Expressionist painters and/or as a draftsman in space. The LACMA exhibition will consider geometry throughout Smith’s oeuvre, revealing a sculptor whose self-constructed identity as a part of the working class motivated him to adopt the utopian optimism of the constructivist avant-garde. Smith himself connected geometry and the artistic avant garde to political sentiment. The fact that Smith came of artistic age in the years immediately following the Depression is also important and illuminates Smith’s sense of himself as a proletarian: “I came directly from pioneer people who were scared for survival and this reinforced my consciousness of the Depression.” The show will include sculptures, drawings, paintings, and photographs from throughout Smith’s career that will elucidate the meaning and importance of geometry in his body of work. LACMA