The High Museum of Art recently acquired a significant collection of 56 prints by artist Kiki Smith from collector Stephen Dull. The acquisition was made through a partial gift from Dull and partial purchase through the museum’s acquisition fund. This group of prints makes the High a major national repository for Smith’s graphic work.
An exhibition, “Kiki Smith: Rituals,” showcasing the new acquisitions, will be on view in the works on paper galleries at the High from October 8 through January 22.
The collection, which includes works made between 1991 and 2004, features many of the artist’s best-known prints and represents all aspects of the extraordinary range of techniques and imagery in her graphic work. Highlights include the monumentally scaled color lithograph “Born,” 2002 (681/8 by 561/8 inches), and the mixed-technique print “My Blue Lake,” 1995 (4311/16 by 54¾ inches), which combines Photogravure, à la poupée inking and lithograph. This collection will join Smith’s important installation “Mother,” acquired by the High in 1993.
Smith (b 1954) is a feminist, politically oriented conceptual artist whose work often focuses the themes of birth, death and regeneration. Her work as a printmaker is particularly extensive and can be found in museums throughout the United States and abroad. She has been the subject of numerous exhibitions. The Museum of Modern Art, New York City, has consistently exhibited and collected her prints, and in 2003 mounted “Kiki Smith: Prints, Drawings & Things,” a major retrospective of her printmaking.
The High is at 1280 Peachtree Street, NE. For information, www.high.org or 404-733-4444.
