Cauleen Smith (b. 1967) is a multidisciplinary artist and filmmaker whose work engages cine- matic landscape, science fiction, and mythology in the Black diaspora. Her immersive installation Mines to Caves evolves out of the artist’s film program GIMME SHELTER CINEGLYPHS that premiered in September 2022 inside Aspen’s Smuggler Mine, the oldest operating silver mine in the region. Smith presents a reimagined edit of her animated cinematic hieroglyphs first projected on the mine walls. Here, the Museum gallery points towards Smuggler Mine’s darkened, cave-like interior. These moving images of animals and topographies reference cave paint- ings, the earliest known art. The experimental film reflects on Smith’s desire to return the mine to the mountain and to reorient towards an alter- native relationship with the planet. In Mines to Caves , Smith foregrounds how tradi- tional capitalist structures like overconsumption and land development affect our relationships to each other and the environment, and draws from work Smith developed during her residency with the Aspen Art Museum and Anderson Ranch in Spring 2022. The film, shot partially on location inside the mine, puts forth the artist’s research around geologic extraction in the United States. Mines to Caves incorporates a candle sculpture composed of different colored wax layers with wicks that will be lit at set times, activating and destroying the work in one turn. Smith’s striated waxworks trace an abstract topography of the earth, emphasizing the politics of creating art that will, like humans, disappear over time.
Humanity’s ephemeral presence on earth and our imaginings of a better present and future are central themes in Smith’s practice. A handsewn textile proclaiming “Mines” hangs in the center of the gallery, at once a flag, a mantra, a heraldic tradition, and a poetic protest. Smith sees mines as a colloquial expression of romantic posses- sion. The artist’s banner draws on the long his- tory of banners raised for celebration as well as social and political change, from those erected by labor unions, carried by community organiz- ers and activists, or flown by marching bands or churches. The gallery’s colorful wallpaper incorporates images of the Pandanus candelabrum plant, a palm tree that grows in soil above diamond bearing kimberlite rock in Liberia and other tropical sites in Africa. The plant marks sites for potential extraction, like an × on nature’s own treasure map. Since humans pillage the land that produces this shrub, the tree is now endangered. In the gallery, Smith envisions a world where this plant grows wild and undisturbed.
Cauleen Smith (b. Riverside, California, 1967) lives and works in Los Angeles, CA. She received her BFA from San Francisco State University, San Francisco, CA, and her MFA from University of California, Los Angeles, CA. Smith is the recipient of several grants and awards, including the 2022 Heinz Award; Guggenheim Fellowship; Joyce Alexander Wein Artist Prize; Ellsworth Kelly Award; The Herb Alpert Award in the Arts; and a Rauschenberg Residency. Smith’s works
have been featured in solo exhibitions at institutions such as Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, CA; Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, NY; Institute of Contemporary Art, Philadelphia, PA; San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco, CA; Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, Chicago, IL; Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, IL; Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art, North Adams, MA; Contemporary Arts Museum Houston,
Houston, TX; and Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh, PA, among others. Her work is included in numerous public collections, such as the Art Institute of Chicago; Los Angeles County Museum of Art; Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; Studio Museum Harlem; Smithsonian Museum of American Art; and the Whitney Museum of American Art.
Made with FlippingBook - professional solution for displaying marketing and sales documents online