AIC's 52nd Annual Meeting

Leon Polk Smith (1906-1996) was a singular and fascinating queer artist of Native American ancestry. During his lifetime, Smith showed nationally and internationally in major museums and historically important galleries, yet art critics often lamented his underappreciation. Now recognized as a forerunner of American Hard-Edge painting in the 1950s, his distinctive shaped canvases and multi-canvas assemblages stand out as unique explorations of color, space, and form. Smith’s lifelong exploration of these artistic elements was influenced by the Midwest landscape of his childhood, spent on Native American territories in present day Oklahoma, and the cityscape of New York City, the chosen and loved home of his adulthood. Contemporary art conservators are familiar with the inherent susceptibility of color field paintings to damages that can alter how the work is perceived, with large cracks, stains, and other changes having the ability to severely disrupt the intended appearance. Smith faced these challenges in repairing his own work during in his lifetime, addressing the damages that arose from frequent handling, packing, and shipping. In addition to his own occasional restorations, the artist also had an affinity for the NYC-based conservator Daniel Goldreyer, preferring his interventions over other recommended professionals.

Through a relationship with the Leon Polk Smith Foundation, the authors have examined hundreds of Leon Polk Smith paintings and acquired a detailed understanding of the artist’s changing working methods over his lifetime. Combining primary source records from the artist’s archive - including artist interviews, personal correspondence, and historic conservation records - with in-depth visual examinations and empirical investigation, we have created a foundational text for understanding the roles that the artist’s material’s natural degradation, extensive exhibition history, and past restorations play in the long-term preservation of the artist’s oeuvre. We discuss the artist’s influential career, studio practice, and technique; identify the artist’s palette and materials, historical framing, and display; and discuss his attitude toward the conservation of his works and the consequences for their future treatment.