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 The titles, which complete the
work, are
lifted from the
encyclopedia of misery.
Lisa Buck,
Melancholic
'Hindsight' Shows Surprising Insight.
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Weekly |
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Rebecca
Schoenkopf
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| "Dying on
the Vine features a
split-pea green facade with a baby's
wooden block in the window. It might be
manipulative; it might be smaltzy, All I
know is, thinking about it later, I
wanted to cry. Of course, without the
title, it would be mirely
inscrutable." |
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| "...Trial
by Fire is probably the
most interesting piece. Against a coppery
background, small twigs bar the small
window and form a prison cell as the nub
of a burnt candle drips wax down the face
of the work. I'm always happy to see some
good paeans to Joan of Arc." |
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Monochromatic Message
Shirle
Gottlieb Long Beach Press Telegram
"Conceptual
in content, these monochromatic paintings all
feature highly textured surfaces that are
achieved from a mixture of plaster, acrylic, and
polymer. Smith then embeds found objects directly
into the matrix, or places them in recessed
apertures that act as miniature stages."
"Though
all the work is intriguing from a conceptual
point of view, people will get different
inferences or meanings depending on how they
relate to it. That is exactly Smith's
intention."
"Are
Smith's paintings really art? In our amorphous
post- modern world where culture, economy,
politics and aesthetics all cry for your
attention - the answer is a resounding
'yes'."
µ
"I haven't
seen Smith's work yet, but it sounds like
a Jumpstart on the caffeinated art scale
- you'll need a four-shot just to keep
from sobbing out loud or curling up fetal
on the couch."
Inigo
Jones, The 'Catalyst'.
Caffeinated Art.
"I'd hang one of his pieces
in my home. Especially the one where the
little locked door, so intriguingly
bloodied, makes one want to open it - and
go inside."
George
Metivier, The Missing
Link. 'Alternative Perception'.
"You
are already Inside"
Linda
Yoon, Darks Art
Parlour. 'Unveiled'.
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"Smith's
work undercuts the severe look of
minimalism with the inclusion of objects
like a single domino in a small recession
off-centered on a canvas. Donald Judd
meets Joseph Cornell."
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"Like
a polite but rambunctious child, the work
in this show wants to do something more
than pretend to be well-behaved, cultured
and proper."
James
Scarborough,
'Uncooperative Abstraction'
at The Project Box in association with
ArtWeek.
"Smith's
career deals with the subjective context
of perception, as with these small staged
constructs and their presentation of the
found object."
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"Smith
suggests that there is more to perception
- than to have perceived."
Mark
Sasway, 'Alternative
Perception' At Portfolio.
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Melancholic 'Hindsight'
Shows Surprising Insight at Portfolio
Lisa
Buck
The
Downtown Gazette
"The title of the exhibition is
itself melancholic: 'Hindsight'
meaning "I figured it out too late", is
a solo exhibition by WL Smith at Portfolio
Gallery. At first glance a show of tidy
minimalist abstractions that proclaim their own
objecthood with a brash attention to surface and
substance, the work soon reveals its quiet
sorrow.
My
favorite pieces are those into which is
cut a neat, rectangular niche. Into the
niche Smith parks a small dead object of
little importance. Benign
Neglect, the color of grimy
terra-cotta, hosts an old, corroded
sprinkler head that stares at the viewer
with a mute ineffectiveness.
The
canvases, if that's what they are, have
the thickness and weight of a chunk of
wall. They are tough, heavy and hard,
like rock or cement, an impression Smith
creates by building up the surface with
impasto, glazes and pigments. |
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The titles which
complete the work, are lifted from the
encyclopedia of misery. It is not the kind of
suffering that yells out in agony, however, but
the dull ache of eternal damnation.
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Like Triage
and Judgment and Ignorance,
they describe the underbelly of the human
condition.
Trial
by Fire is as grim as a
life sentence in a forgotten dungeon.
Colored the brown of rain-soaked rock,
the painting encloses an extinguished
candle behind a rusted fence. Little
drips of wax dribble from the cell,
lending an element of pathos to this
metaphor for resignation. |
Looking like a
slab of smog-corroded marble, Compromise
houses an old high-intensity light bulb and is
wrapped in barbed wire. Where the barbs touch the
surface, there are little red gashes that look
like wounds. Bleeding rock in bondage. I love it.
Despite the
tone of gloom and woe conveyed by Smith's work,
there is a touch of cheer in their physical
appeal. They are really, very nice paintings.
This is art that keeps on giving." µ
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Purgatory
By
Emily Bumgarner
A class project by a twenty-two year old
sociology major who contacted the artist with a
copyright use request.
Impresssed with what was written, the text now
appears here.
When people walk through an
art gallery they usually pick out a piece that
for one reason or another catches their eye. Very
few people stop to figure out what each detail
means. The buyer would be surprised if they took
it for more than face value. An artist expresses
a point of view and feelings in everything they
make. It can be a dream to see the ocean or a
political statement. The point of the picture may
be as simple as the title or it could be found in
the last brush stroke. The artist want's to
communicate with a large number of people at once
and there is no better way than mass media. By
just figuring out the meaning of the title, one
has started the climb into the artist's mind.
Purgatory is
the postponement of heaven while suffering is
inflicted to forgive sins. The New Catholic
Encyclopedia acknowledges: "In the final
analysis, the catholic doctrine on purgatory is
based on tradition, not sacred scripture."
This temporal punishment is for those who died in
grace but are not free yet from all imperfection.
To those of us who are not without sin, the
traditional belief of purgatory may act as a
comfort when looking at the alternative, hell. In
1991, WL Smith created to challenge the
definition and creators of purgatory."Purgatory"
using tangible items to interpret the doctrine.
The artist uses this creation
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Blood catches my eyes, then scratch marks upon
the door. Chills hit my spine as I feel the pain
and suffering in the piece. The key hole locks
the vault and the occupants within. All humans
are imperfect and only one, Jesus, was free from
sin. With that fact in mind most of mankind would
be in purgatory. What is so comforting knowing
that I will work hard all of my life to be the
best person possible and still have to suffer? It
doesn't make much sense. Behind that door the
living don't know what happens. By the looks of
the blood from the dripping key hole it is not
pleasant.
Adding a bit of
history, Jesus died as a ransom sacrifice for all
mankind. It is through him that our sins are
forgiven. (With nails driven into his body, being
beat and tortured to his death, so that mankind
would be free from such punishment) The mere
suggestion of purgatory degrades his sacrifice.
The ludicrousness of this idea helps support of
purgatory as Mr. Smith's definition.
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The traditional teaching is also out dated and a
very old way of thinking. Knowing that Mr. Smith
is some what of an activist the thought of a
bunch of old men sitting around thinking up
another way to control people is probably what
moved him in choosing his materials. He chose an
antique key plate. One reason for that choice
might have been that that was what was available
at the time. A more logical reason would be to
express a point. Why should people be frightened
into a life that some old stuffed shirt dictated
to people so long ago that the idea is more
antique than the key plate? The answer; we should
dictate our lives, not doctrines invented in the
imaginations of control freaks.
Another
outstanding use of materials is demonstrated with
the use of plaster, acrylic, and tempera on
canvas. Mr. Smith combined these items to make
the cement box. Cement last for decades and if an
animal were to die in it, its imprint could be
preserved, as happened with the idea of
purgatory. No where in the Bible is purgatory
mentioned, a fact the Catholic Church recognizes.
But it is continued to be taught because of
tradition, also known as a fossil being stuck in
cement. Once cement is set it can't be changed,
maybe that is what is meant by being stuck in
your ways, purgatory is a perfect example.
The scratches
on the door mean more than the obvious pain of
souls in purgatory. They are the wanting out of
tradition. The artist himself is an activist, he
along with others continue fighting old ways to
breed new ways. Society and tradition change with
every voice just as the scratches have warped the
door and changed it. Eventually purgatory won't
be taught. Not because men have lost. µ |
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