SHINIQUE SMITH: METAMORPH
Metamorph, 2024
moniquemeloche is pleased to present Shinique Smith: METAMORPH, the artist’s first solo exhibition with the gallery. Renowned for her monumental fabric sculptures and abstract paintings of calligraphy and collage, Smith’s wide-ranging practice operates at the convergence of consumption and spiritual sanctuary, balancing forces and revealing connections across space, time, race, gender and place to suggest the possibility of new worlds. Inspired by as the artist refers, her “magical childhood experiences” (from chanting with His Holiness the Dalai Lama, to tagging in a graffiti crew in Baltimore, to attending fashion shows in Paris and New York with her mother), Smith’s practice expresses the wonder, connections and ecstatic moments, that she as a Black woman, finds within textiles, keepsakes and sayings exchanged between her family, friends and travels.
Through layered and transformative processes, METAMORPH presents intersecting forces of personal history, influence and vibrant energy as seen through Smith’s keen and emphatic lens. Reflecting on her journey of growth, the works on view create a world for herself that she can revel in and share, foregrounding the universality of the human experience and our desire to find wonder in the everyday movements of life.