Michael E. Smith

Henry Moore Institute, Leeds is delighted to present an exhibition of new work by American artist Michael E. Smith (born 1977, Detroit), made for the Institute’s main galleries.

Until they are installed in an exhibition, Smith’s sculptures exist as composite parts or what the artist calls ‘material sketches’. It is only when Smith is on site, typically working out of hours and with one assistant, that new and complete works come into existence. Critical juxtapositions are made between different materials, objects and the gallery’s environment, incorporating improvisation and the limitations of the exhibition site (architecture, flow, lighting) as guiding forces.

Extracted from today’s relentless global workflow of production – consumption – destruction, Smith’s materials are familiar in their raw states, and remain so once absorbed into a finished sculpture. Clothes, furniture, toys, tools, objects from the home and from industry are commonplace and used, from time to time, alongside organic matter.

While there is art historical precedent within Smith’s object making (assemblage, conceptualism, minimalism) and his approach to institutional commentary, these are departure points for a resolutely idiosyncratic way of working. Smith researches his chosen materials to an extraordinary degree, examining associative histories and use value as well as their physical properties.

With an engineer’s mindset, he tests materials to their limits, squeezing them until reference and meaning almost buckle. Reconfiguring them alongside other objects and combining them with the features and functions of the exhibition space (Smith is always interested in how visitors interact with and navigate institutional buildings), a new kind of social history is revealed.

Prior to (or as part of) his making, Smith fills notebooks – covering pages with key words as might a lyricist. Hip Hop has always been a driving force for him, so too has the blues and the improvisational wanderings of free jazz. They cue an emotional register in much of his work and its engagement with the world.

There’s a long history of songwriters only being able to write in moments of non-joy. Smith’s making is the same. Despite the criticality of writing to his process, however, words are seen as unnecessary weight and titles are seldom used. Look instead at the list of materials, which are finely tuned, authored, and revelatory.

The environment of Smith’s exhibitions is typically off-kilter, remote, sometimes violent or slapstick. They are reflections upon the strangeness of the impulses that gave birth to the constituent parts of his sculpture: global economic, environmental and political dis-ease. His sculptures are bound to a recent history yet float in a ghostly timelessness. Everything is recognisable, but displaced.