I made a statue of a woman standing, holding a deer. The deer lays back on the woman’s neck. There is no space between them. Her fur is against her skin. We are intimate animals. She is a red plant. Her eyes are diamond, exposed and clear.

Kiki Smith

Kiki Smith (b.1954 Nuremberg, Germany) is an artist of international prominence whose career has spanned over three decades. She is a leading figure among artists addressing philosophical, social, and spiritual aspects of human nature. Her explorations of the human condition, the body, and the realms of spirituality and nature have resulted in works of exceptional power and beauty spanning mediums from sculpture and printmaking to installation and textil

Since 1979, Kiki Smith has been the subject of more than 150 solo exhibitions internationally, including a major traveling exhibition that originated in Museum Haus Esters, Kunstmuseen Krefeld, Germany, and traveled to three venues in Europe and the United States from 2008 to 2010. Smith’s work has been included multiple times in the Whitney Biennial (1991, 1993, 2002); La Biennale di Firenze (1996-1997; 1998); and La Biennale di Venezia (1993, 1999, 2005, 2009), where in 2011, she participated in the group exhibition Glasstress at the Palazzo Cavalli Franchetti (June 4 – Nov. 27, 2011). Her work is held in more than 50 important public collections internationally.

Smith’s many accolades include the Theo Westenberger Women of Excellence Award (2010); Nelson A. Rockefeller Award, Purchase College School of the Arts (2010); Women in the Arts Award, Brooklyn Museum (2009); 50th Edward MacDowell Medal (2009); Medal Award, School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (2006); Athena Award for Excellence in Printmaking, Rhode Island School of Design (2006), and the Skowhegan Medal for Sculpture (2000). Smith was elected a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters, New York. In 2006 TIME Magazine named her one of the TIME 100: The People Who Shape Our World.

Kiki Smith lives and works in New York City.