By the Light, 2024

SHINIQUE SMITH
By the Light, 2024
23 x 17.75 inches
Archival pigment print on Hahnemühle Photo Rag Satin paper
Limited edition of 5 Hand-Embellished Prints
Limited edition of 20 Signed and numbered prints with 5 APs
All prints signed and numbered by the Artist

Shinique Smith (b. 1971, Baltimore, MD) is known for her monumental sculptures and abstract paintings of calligraphy and collage. Inspired by her unique and magical childhood experiences, Smith has gleaned visual poetry from clothing and explored concepts of ritual using breath, bunding and calligraphy as tools toward abstraction. Her layered works range from palm-sized bundled microcosms to monolithic bales to massive energetic paintings that contain vibrant and carefully collected mementos from her life such as in By the Light. Smith has embellished five prints in the edition with swatches of fabric throughout the composition, making each unique.

Smith works at the convergence of consumption and spiritual sanctuary, balancing forces and revealing connections across space and time, race, gender, and place to suggest the possibility of new worlds. She intertwines personal histories and belongings with thoughts of the vast nature of ‘things’ that we consume, cherish, gift and discard and how these objects resonate on intimate and social scales.

Smith attended the famed Baltimore School for the Arts for high school, Maryland Institute College of Art, obtaining a BFA in 1992 and MFA in 2003. She also received her Master of Arts in Teaching from Tufts University and the Museum School in 2000. Notable solo exhibitions include The Ringling Museum of Art, Sarasota, FL, (2023); Center for Maine Contemporary Art, Rockland, ME, (2023); Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art, Overland Park, KS (2022); USB Art Collection, NY (2019); California African American Museum (2018); The Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, MA (2015); Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, CA (2013); SCAD Museum, Atlanta, GA (2011); Museum of Contemporary Art, North Miami, Fl (2010); and the Studio Museum in Harlem, Harlem, NY (2009).

Her work has gained attention through her participation in celebrated biennials and group exhibitions including the 13th Biennial de Cuenca and 8th Busan Biennale; the Studio Museum in Harlem, the Rubell Family Collection, the New Museum and Hauser + Wirth LA; Smart Museum of Art; and Museum of the African Diaspora; and the Newark Museum. She has also created several landmark public works for NY Metro Arts, Chicago Transit Authority, Wabash Arts Corridor and USCF Medical Center among others, and has recently launched her monumental new mosaic mural to the public at MLK Jr Crenshaw station as part of the Los Angeles Metro’s New K Line.

Smith’s work has also been collected and exhibited by other prestigious institutions such as the National Museum of Women in the Arts, Baltimore Museum of Art; Brooklyn Museum of Art; California African American Museum, Denver Art Museum, Guggenheim Museum; Frist Art Museum; Minneapolis Art Institute; MOMA PS1; Musée d’art Contemporain de Montréal; National Portrait Gallery, DC; the Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art; the Newark Museum; and the Whitney Museum. She is the recipient of several awards and prizes including the American Academy of Arts & Letters Purchase Prize, (2022); Anonymous Was a Woman Artist Award (2016); Louis Comfort Tiffany Foundation Award (2013); MICA Alumni Medal of Honor (2012); Joan Mitchell Foundation Fellowship (2008); and the Aljira Center for Contemporary Arts Fellowship(2005). Smith currently lives and works in Los Angeles, CA.

This print is part of a suite of limited edition prints by a group of moniquemeloche artists commissioned on the occasion of EXPO Chicago 2024 to amplify the necessity and power of creativity in shaping inclusive civic discourse. Proceeds will benefit the artists and For Freedoms’ upcoming initiatives. 

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• Unframed prints ship within 1-3 weeks and framed prints ship within 4-6 weeks.
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