Molly Smith’s third solo exhibition in New York, Whether, confronts the ethereal nature of her work within arrangements of sculptures and wall pieces.

Using materials that are a combination of found objects and the hand made, Smith’s work is a response to observations gleaned from her surroundings. The temporality of the found constructions overlaid with the color and shapes of her cast plaster and cut paper provide a glimpse of a transcendent moment. Smith describes her visceral process:

Walking to my studio, a discarded object I pass on the sidewalk is transformed in my mind, eliciting narrative possibilities through its gesture, condition and context. I am drawn to the enigmatic possibilities of an accidental scene, as much as to the aesthetic allure of the physical shapes within it. The images waver between coming together in their specificity and falling apart in ambiguity. I explore this transition from image to abstraction, whole to part.

Through her manipulation of materials and pre-existing forms, Smith physically explores tension, depth and gravity. Her juxtapositions capture fleeting memories and shifting perceptions of objects.

Molly Smith was born in 1976 in Kansas City, Missouri. She spent the second half of her childhood in Huntsville, Alabama, before obtaining her BFA from the Rhode Island School of Design in 1999. Smith obtained her MFA from Columbia University in 2004. Her first solo show, One Wave, One Day, was at KS Art in 2006. It was reviewed as a Critics’ Picks on Artforum.com by Lauren O’Neill Butler. Her second solo exhibition, Between You and Me, took place at KS Art in 2008. The exhibition was mentioned in New York Magazine as well as The New Yorker. Smith’s work has been included in group exhibitions at a number of galleries and institutions including Contemporary Arts Center, Cincinnati, Ohio, Gallery Min Min, Tokyo, Japan, Roger Bjorkholmen Galleri, Stockholm, Sweden, Midway Contemporary Art, St.Paul, MN, and Horticultural Society of New York, New York, NY.