This April, Lee Trombly ’26 and Molly Sullivan ’27 prepared an interview with resident artist Brian Smith, one of the Spring 2024 Fellows at the Lunder Institute for American Art.
Brian Smith: I just finished a body of work that dealt with using queer ecology as an underlying theme, imagining a future where we adapt to live in the waters in response to climate change. That was my last body of work and I feel it to be a little more cohesive than what’s going on here. I kind of view this as my interim, because some pieces are going to the PMA [Portland Museum of Art], and some pieces are hopefully going to New York, so they’re all scattering. I’m somewhat between bodies of work, but the theme is continuing and will continue.
Lee Trombly: You talked a lot about bridging the concepts of humanity and ecology. I was really curious what your thought process is behind that. What inspires you to bridge those concepts?
Brian Smith: Well, I can’t shake climate change out of my mind, as many of us can’t. We’re in this world that is, you know, on a path to spiraling out of control. And so for a while, I was focusing on just eco-based art, thinking about the climate catastrophe in depth, and just getting super depressed.
Then I started utilizing this more queer approach. Queerness could be as in gender and sexuality, or it also can mean a different approach to something. In queer ecology, it’s looking at the typically heteropatriarchal views toward ecology, toward climate change, and challenging them.
So, for example, I’m using moving into the waters, turning into merpeople, which is a really flamboyant solution to climate change. The works that I’m doing are generally colorful, they’re generally fun and optimistic, which, while dealing with climate change, is definitely at odds. But I’ve found that that’s been a really great access point for myself to continue to work with this theme, and also viewers, so we don’t spiral into eco-anxiety.
Lee Trombly: Right, I really appreciate that answer. So, tell me about the work that you’re creating while you’re here. Why this work, why these materials, and why now?
Brian Smith: I love working with a bunch of different mediums at all times. That’s not anything that’s new per se, but the ceramics and mosaics that I’ve done working here are new. I’m thinking about what will be for the PMA [exhibition], which is coming up this October through April [2025].
Lee Trombly: Can you take me through your artistic process, how your ideas go from this concept to a final product? I’m also really curious to hear you talk about this kind of urgency that comes with climate change. Is that adding to your thought process at all, and how does it find its way into the final product?
Brian Smith: Okay, yes, definitely. Great question. I guess the bead pieces are really interesting because we were talking about urgency and they’re like the slowest process in the world. Physically, you know, I can actually slow the nerves in my body, and so I can work with this and know that, for me, this is one of the more productive ways that I can address what’s going on because my toolbox is art.
For this piece, I had to plan everything out. I had to weld an armature and cast the substrate that I’m using, and then subtract and add to it, before I could even consider applying the beads. This type of process is very analytical. Like a lot of my ideas come from really poor sketches on my notes app, or I recently got an iPad, which has been immensely helpful for all of my processes, because I have this thing where a pencil to paper is a little too permanent for me.
I like to work through technology, to start off to get my idea, and then from there, it’s just a lot of planning. At this point, being intuitive with three dimensions is something that I have learned through years of working in sculpture. In the planning process, I can make the substrate in a couple of days and then go to the beading.
Lee Trombly: Your work often explores complex themes such as identity and humanity. How do you convey these themes through the aesthetics and forms of your work?
Brian Smith: I feel that the emotion that I put into these works is one of exploration and play, and kind of tinkering and figuring. I think that is conveyed to the viewer when they look at the works.
They’re bright, they’re pretty flashy, because they’re usually covered in these exuberant materials, and they’re heavily surfaced, which to me kind of equates to nature rather than a smooth environment. If you look around this room, everything’s smooth. But then if you were in the forest, you won’t find as many completely smooth elements. So, I think that those are ways that I conveyed that. Viewers can look at this mermaid tail, for example, and they recognize it as a mermaid tail, they’re intrigued by the texture, and they’re realizing that this is a humanoid underwater. Then they may start to think about, you know, ‘What if I was a mermaid as well?’.
I think that providing those access points is really important for the work, so I don’t get horribly depressed all the time while making it, and so that viewers can relate and start to think about their relationship to nature.
Lee Trombly: We are in a small town, and relative to Maine, fairly far from the ocean. How has being at Colby, and in a studio that is not your own, changed your artistic process? Are you pulling from your surroundings? I’m also really interested to hear about your packing list and what you chose to bring with you.
Brian Smith: Well, packing list, I seemingly brought my entire studio. I brought way more than I thought I could accomplish, and I knew that as I was packing. In my proposal for what I was going to work on, I was like, I’m going to make this many large sculptures and this many small sculptures and this many paintings. I brought a bunch of supports for painting and I just had no time to get into it. I began thinking that to have this kind of space and time to focus on sculpture, often ones that take so long and are repetitive, it made sense to stay in that headspace.
As far as the first question, it’s interesting. We’re kind of only familiar with what’s in the ocean from what we see at like an aquarium, or what we see through documentaries, and so even being right next to the ocean, we have no idea what’s in there. So I find the best way to keep myself within that mindset is to be surrounded by my works, because I’m kind of imagining worlds that aren’t there yet. Something like this piece over here, which is in progress: it’s going to be an Octopansy, so octopus and pansy together.
Being surrounded by this Octopansy, and the mermaid tail, and this giant conch shell on the wall, helps me to think maybe I want to work more figuratively, maybe I should work with a mosaic and make a figure coming out of the water.
Brian Smith: I feel like in sculpture, it is really difficult to convey something specific to the audience. To me, it feels like that’s maybe slightly simpler to do working with 2D, like drawing or painting, and, of course, film and photography. I’ve always been kind of okay with the fact that someone may look at something and not know exactly the story. I like to work with titles, and I haven’t titled any of these yet, so I don’t have a good example, but I feel like titles are a good way to convey what the pieces are about.
There are things that I do that kind of place the viewer underwater. In my last show, I had metal rods that were wrapped with chains, and then pigmented grout and they went all the way up to the ceiling. They were surrounded by a little bit of cobalt blue sand at the bottom. I was calling them eelgrass. I used that tactic to let the viewer know at that show that this took place underwater. Similarly, with this piece (the mermaid tail that I’m working with), I’m having this tail go into what will be like an underwater cave, also placing a viewer underwater.
In that respect, if the viewer is considering that they may be underwater and they’re surrounded by this exuberance, they may start to think about, ‘What would it be like to live underwater?’, I hope that play and experimentation and campiness and exuberance are imparted on the viewer, but I’m really happy with them interpreting it how they do.
Lee Trombly: So, collaboration and an exchange of ideas are oftentimes the cornerstones of an art residency. Would you say this is something that you’ve experienced during your time here? If so, how has it affected your art, maybe in results or even just the process?
Brian Smith: I did a collaboration with Jillian [Impastato] at the Colby Museum, and we did a queer art reading of Alex Katz’s work, which was interesting just to think about. I focused on the natural paintings in that room, and I brought a lot of questions to community members and students who came to the event. That was a really interesting way to collaborate. Mostly the questions that I asked were about their own comfort level in nature and what Katz’s pieces brought up for them.
I’m working with two Colby students who are helping me with this, and it’s been really, really amazing: Jess Xing and Norah Adler. We’ve been working on a piece together. I made the form and then they’ve been helping me surface it. We’re working from a projection that’s shot above trying to mimic dappled light underwater. But they have complete freedom on how they want to interpret it, so that’s been an amazing collaboration.
Lee Trombly: Colby students and the entire Waterville community are very lucky to have you here in residence! Is there a legacy that you want to leave behind here? Are you hoping to leave Colby students something to chew on?
Brian Smith: I feel very privileged to have met a lot of Colby students through this. I’ve had three classes come to visit. I had a sculpture class come to visit and that was really impactful because it was an artist’s talk. I felt like I could talk shop with the sculpture class and pick up the sculptures and flip them upside down and be like, this is how I make this. It felt really nice to be able to share my secrets with the sculpture students.
Lunder Institute Open Studios was less Colby-based; it was more centered on families associated with the Youth Art Month show downstairs, so there were a lot of community members that I hadn’t met. Many hadn’t heard of queer ecology, but they had their own ideas about this work. Many were thinking about Aquaman or some movie about living underwater, which was really interesting. For those students who came through, it was really wonderful to see them so excited about this type of work, and working with all the beads, and meeting professional artists.
This interview was created for Colby College course AR356, Writing Art Criticism, conducted at the Greene Block + Studios, Waterville, Maine, on April 12, 2024. Questions prepared by Lee Trombly ’26 and Molly Sullivan ’27; interview conducted by Lee Trombly.