Barbara T. Smith

Field Piece, installed at the Long Beach Museum of Art, 1972, Barbara T. Smith. Getty Research Institute, 2014.M.14

Last year, I visited the two Barbara T. Smith exhibits at the Getty Research Institute and ICA LA. In exploring the archival expanse of her work over the last 62 years, I was captivated by the sensual, spiritual, and culturally critical components inherent in it. Smith is widely known as a performance artist whose fame arose during the 1960s while working in a multitude of mediums including Xerox, sculpture, paint, amongst others. Her work provokes questions that interrogate our social structures, identity, and consciousness.

The creative force she is, Smith continues to make art today at the age of 93. I was curious to know how, in a life full of obstacles and distractions, she was still able to do it. On a sunny Spring afternoon Barabara and I sat in the living room of her 1-bedroom apartment in East Hollywood where I had the pleasure of chatting wither her about her practice.

T. Michael Jagger and Catherine Miller in Nude Frieze, performed at F-Space, Santa Ana, CA, 1972, Barbara T. Smith. Getty Research Institute, 2014.M.14

She started by reading me a few excerpts from the books on her shelves as we flipped through some of her recent publications. She began telling me about the current project she has been conceptualizing which led me to ask what she has found to be the most essential element to sustaining her life’s work. 

“Paying attention, that’s it,.” she says.

Simple and straightforward, as most of the best prescriptions are, I thought. Yet, she is in no way oblivious to the inevitable appearance of road blocks. 

“[To come back to creating] one way is to go where other people like you are. As young artists, if they’re very serious about their art and that’s what they want to do, they should definitely hang out with other artists.

Go to the galleries. Get jobs in the galleries or in the museums so that they stay in connection with people who take this activity as real. If you get far away, say in Kansas, they haven't a clue about any of this.” 

Photograph of Untitled (red triangle), from the Black Glass Paintings series, 1965–66, Barbara T. Smith. Getty Research Institute, 2014.M.14

This made me think that as much as artists require time to be alone and to create in isolation, they also depend on community for inspiration, learning, sharing, and mutual upliftment. There will come a time when those environments may not be available and therefore should not be taken for granted. Despite this, at the end of the day, Smith still believes creation comes back to the self. 

“I’m not dialoguing with other art as much…I'm just making art out of my life experience… Use your life as the vehicle for making art. It provokes questions just by existing. [My life] is being transformed all the time by the circumstances and I tend to be good to myself.”

She expressed gratitude for being in the assisted living home where she currently stays - a space where she can continue to create. Here, there is a small library filled with books she claimed she wouldn’t normally choose but has taken pleasure in exploring. She hopes to walk the grounds if she can build up the physical stamina and she has even made some new friends since her arrival earlier this year.

We then proceeded to talk about the nature of aging and the existential truth she inches toward. She asked herself “How does one process boarding a plane or seeing your children for what you know to be the last time? What may be on the other side?” She could not even respond with a guess for either but simply accepted the reality of not knowing.

Before leaving her apartment, she gave me a final piece of wisdom to take with me:

Pure Food, performed in Costa Mesa, CA, 1973, Barbara T. Smith.Getty Research Institute, 2014.M.14

“Most people believe that their mind is who they are because the mind is what they use to read or solve problems. There’s another layer back which is more profound which energizes the mind or the body separate from the mind. 

When profound meditation goes on you get less and less separated into parts of yourself. There’s just one thing here that breathes and that being is aware and it can engage in thought, but it doesn’t have to. So, you see, your mind isn’t necessarily ‘thought.’ It can just be and feel…This undifferentiated mind is more likely who we are. 

Don’t just meditate but go to a retreat where they teach you how to meditate well where you do it for 8 to 10 hours a day so it's intense because that's where you really open up: the long, very difficult mediations. I can remember sitting in this Buddhist meditation center - that's where I learned to do it - and I'm sitting there thinking, ‘When is this gonna stop? How are we gonna get out of here? This is ridiculous. I'm sitting on this stupid pillow and I could be out weeding my garden or hanging out with my friends.’ My mind is agitated and then all of a sudden [the other level] kicks in. Not only am I not thinking anymore but I'm in a state of bliss, I’m totally blissful and I could stay there forever.

It teaches you a lot about the structure of the human.”