Leon Polk Smith

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Leon Polk Smith, “Untitled,” 1962

paint on cardboard from artist pad, 23.9" x 19" (courtesy of The Leon Polk Smith Foundation, New York; photo by Adam Reich)

Leon Polk Smith: Big Form, Big Space – at the Contemporary Art Gallery in Vancouver until Aug. 22 – is the first solo exhibition of this American artist’s work at a public gallery in Canada. Smith, whose work is associated with the hard-edge school, developed a practice of geometric abstraction influenced by modernists like Mondrian, Brancusi, Arp and Matisse.  

Smith’s style is both minimalist in construction and maximalist in colour and gesture. This tension allows for deep reflection on the territory within the frame and the movement and scale it contains. 

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Leon Polk Smith, “Untitled,” 1960

paint on canvasette, 20" x 16" (courtesy of The Leon Polk Smith Foundation, New York; photo by Adam Reich)

Don’t be fooled by the term hard-edge. Yes, Smith’s colour blocking gives way to a natural sharpness, but take care not to overlook the curves. Round contours rub shoulders with each other and vibrant, beckoning colours set the limits of this friction. The result is soft and intimate. You could call it sexy, but there’s more.

Unlike Mondrian’s grid structures – where geometry is meant to propel the viewer to a spirituality beyond reality – Smith’s abstract lines share their autonomy with the viewer, carrying a level of human sway. A right-angle pivots with intention. A blue bulge bubbles and slopes into a field of opaque green as if to drape an arm or rest a head. Lines conduct their own kinesis, tugging the viewer’s body with their momentum. 

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Leon Polk Smith, “Untitled,” 1959

paper on paper (watermarked and embossed), 25.5" x 19.6" (courtesy of The Leon Polk Smith Foundation, New York; photo by Adam Reich)

These works, primarily from the 1950s, frame worlds where colour and contour teem with excited energy, mastering a level of abstraction that, delightfully, requires little of the viewer. There’s no need for research or backstory to experience their many pleasures. Their ease of form offers freedom. 

This doesn’t mean Smith has faded from view. He’s there in the details. 

His paper cutout collages invite closer inspection. Draw your eyes near the art. An island of yellow wavers as it pushes against a large sage-green mass. The line is uneven, even trembling. While this flawed motion may anthropomorphize the track of colour, it also opens up towards the artist’s hand. I imagine Smith working with his scissors. I see his hand moving along the paper – carefully, or maybe, not so carefully, and witness the simplicity and intimacy of his craft.  

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Leon Polk Smith, “Untitled,” 1956

paint on canvasette, 20" x 16" (courtesy of The Leon Polk Smith Foundation, New York; photo by Adam Reich)

Guest curator Nigel Prince has worked to contextualize Smith’s work along the lines of subject and identity. Smith, who died in 1996, was a queer, mixed-race Cherokee artist. While Smith quietly wove the experience of Indigeneity and the American Southwest into works such as Stretch of Black No. 5 (1954) and Black White Repeat with Red No. 2 (1953), these facets of his identity merely rest on the surface, possibly inviting viewers to probe a little deeper. 

However, I like the idea that Smith is quietly testing us to read his work against his biography. As I see it, Smith’s abstractions are afforded independence to operate freely without much narrative, releasing the viewer to an open exploration of space. ■  

Leon Polk Smith: Big Form, Big Space at the Contemporary Art Gallery in Vancouver from May 14 to Aug. 22, 2021.

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