Paul Anthony Smith
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Paul Anthony SmithDreams Deferred #662024Oil stick on inkjet print mounted on Dibond40 x 50 in. (101.6 x 127 cm)
Framed: 41 ⅜ x 51 ⅜ in. (105.1 x 130.5 cm) -
Paul Anthony SmithDreams Deferred #672024Oil stick on inkjet print mounted on Dibond40 x 50 in. (101.6 x 127 cm)
Framed: 41 ⅜ x 51 ⅜ in. (105.1 x 130.5 cm) -
Paul Anthony SmithDreams Deferred #682024Oil stick on inkjet print mounted on Dibond40 x 50 in. (101.6 x 127 cm)
Framed: 41 ⅜ x 51 ⅜ in. (105.1 x 130.5 cm) -
Paul Anthony SmithDreams Deferred #742024Oil stick on inkjet print mounted on Dibond40 x 50 in. (101.6 x 127 cm)
Framed: 40 ½ x 50 ½ in. (102.87 x 128.27 cm) -
Paul Anthony SmithDreams Deferred #782024Oil stick on inkjet print mounted on Dibond40 x 50 in. (101.6 x 127 cm)
Framed: 40 ½ x 50 ½ in. (102.87 x 128.27 cm) -
Paul Anthony SmithDreams Deferred #652023Oil stick and spray paint on inkjet print mounted on Dibond80 x 90 in. (203 x 229 cm)
Framed: 81 ¾ x 97 ⅞ x 2 in. (207.6 x 248.6 x 5.1 cm)
My process enables my art to question the potential of a photo to retain and tell the truth of one's past while achieving a texture that appears almost iridescent on the surfaces of the works.
Paul Anthony Smith (b. 1988, St. Ann’s Bay, Jamaica) is a Jamaica-born, New York-based artist who explores themes of post-diasporic identity, community, and cultural memory through his paintings and photography. In candid scenes of friends and family, he introduces an element of subjectivity and personal history to photographic documentation. Often with oil or spray paint, the artist inserts borders, fences, barriers, or masks onto images printed on Dibond sheets, emphasising the architectural and psychological impact of these oppressive forms. In 2012, Smith began incorporating a technique called “picotage,” in which he uses a retrofitted wooden needle to puncture and disrupt the surface of his inkjet prints, heightening depth and texture while further complicating our notions of truth and memory.
After studying ceramics at the Kansas City Art Institute, Smith moved to New York City in 2014, where he now lives and works. His recent Dreams Deferred series, which draws its inspiration and title from Langston Hughes’s seminal long-form poem, depicts the vacant lots and urban neighborhoods he encounters regularly in his life today. By overlaying shadowy fences on these familiar environments, he captures the collective disillusionment that pervaded the African American experience during the early 20th century and calls to mind social, cultural, and physical restrictions to access and equality. In January 2024, a collection of his large-scale picotage works that wrestle with these themes were featured in Passage, a solo exhibition at the Hyde Collection in Glen Falls, New York.
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Tribeca Festival and Chanel Announce Artist Awards Participants
Marc Malkin, Variety, 22 May 2024 -
Paint Drippings: Everything You Missed in the Art Industry Last Week
Annie Armstrong, Artnet, 20 May 2024 -
Timothy Taylor now represents Paul Anthony Smith
Maxwell Rabb, Artsy, 20 May 2024 -
New Representation for Paul Anthony Smith
Victoria L. Valentine, Culture Type, 19 May 2024 -
Paul Anthony Smith joins Timothy Taylor
The Art MarketMelanie Gerlis, Financial Times, 16 May 2024 -
Podcast: A conversation with Paul Anthony Smith
Monica Sandreczki, North Country Public Radio, 7 March 2024 -
Paul Anthony Smith: Artlyst’s Top 10 Art Basel Miami Beach Artworks 2023
Clayton Calvert, Artlyst, 10 December 2023
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Paul Anthony Smith in Multiplicity: Blackness in Contemporary American Collage
Phillips Collection, Washington, D.C. 6 July – 22 September 2024Multiplicity: Blackness in Contemporary American Collage is the first large-scale exhibition dedicated to exploring collage by contemporary Black American artists such as Mark Bradford, Kerry...Read More -
Paul Anthony Smith in 2024 Tribeca Festival Artist Awards Program
5 June – 16 JuneEach year, Tribeca and CHANEL invite visual artists to generously offer one of their works to winning filmmakers of the Tribeca Festival. This unique program...Read More -
Paul Anthony Smith Joins Timothy Taylor
16 May 2024Timothy Taylor is pleased to announce the representation of Paul Anthony Smith in London. The gallery will present an exhibition of new work by the...Read More -
Paul Anthony Smith: Passage
The Hyde Collection, Glens Falls, NY 27 January – 2 June 2024Paul Anthony Smith (b. Jamaica, 1988) makes large-scale photo-based works thematizing colonialism, displacement, migration, and memory. Passage features landscapes photographed in the Caribbean, Smith’s birthplace,...Read More