Lauren Dana Smith: The Natural World & Human Consciousness
Lauren Dana Smith is a painter, writer and art therapist based in Taos, New Mexico. She creates textural and sculptural paintings that explore the interior spaces and exterior boundaries of physical form, the natural world and human consciousness. Her digital work expresses the tension and musculature of body and soul; the interior spaces we occupy, and those which inhabit us.
How did your creative journey begin?
I have always identified as an artist; from a very early age. My mother really demonstrated the importance of art and creativity in all aspects of life, and when I was very young, living in Philadelphia, I remember we would spend almost all of our time going to art museums and making art together. I have fond memories of those very early years and was able to hold onto that as later parts of my childhood and young adulthood became more complex and challenging. I continued on a creative path through high school, undergrad where I studied painting and writing, and then ultimately onto graduate school at Pratt Institute in NYC, where I decided to pursue a degree and career in Creative Arts Therapy and Creativity Development (and where I now also teach in the graduate program). Now, I truly get to enjoy the integration of my artist practice and my role as an art psychotherapist for others – connecting people to their own creative identities as a natural internal resource and finding opportunities to reflect upon my own life experiences and make meaning in my own art practice.
Where do you find inspiration for your work?
I am frequently drawn to the less conscious parts of ourselves and the relationships we have with our own inner dialogues. I think about this in parallel to how we experience our immediate external environments. Living in the high desert of New Mexico, in Taos, I am constantly observing the psychology of topography and the sometimes subtle, but frequently dramatic variations in color, form, texture and mood. This new environment has certainly made its way into my art practice. I had previously lived in NYC for about twenty years and was inspired by my social, cultural and professional experiences, but my relationship to my artmaking has become far more intimate and meditative with my shift in geography.
Right now, I am exploring two different series. The first is a large-scale sculptural series that utilizes plaster, gauze, upcycled materials such as cardboard, plastics, natural pigments and paper to create dynamic and emotional sculptural paintings. I’m staying away from color in this series to explore the ability to generate a sense of emotional tension or reconciliation, purely through form, texture and gravity. I am also working on a grouping of digital paintings that investigates in the internal state. They have an almost cellular quality to them.
Both of these series reference my experience of the land in New Mexico and my own relationship to personal psychology as well as my experience working for many years as a psychotherapist in big city hospitals with people coping with life-limiting illnesses or end-of-life experiences. It has been a beautiful and provocative season of making work in the studio because I’m able to make much clearer sense of some very challenging personal moments. I have a new understanding of my relationship to my art practice and artist identity – aspects of self that I feel are always evolving for all of us. We are always in a state of inquiry.
How has your work shifted and evolved over time?
My work has evolved into abstraction from a more literal and representational place. I previously utilized the juxtaposition of unusual images, photographs, memories or cultural reference points as the content for my paintings. They were always in the service of creating a particular mood. I would start with the feeling or atmosphere I would want to create and then begin assembling this fantastical worlds. In some ways, I still do that, however the content is abstracted form, texture, concept and relationship.
What does a typical day in the studio look like for you, and how has your art practice grown or changed?
Since I still see a small number of therapy clients virtually, via telehealth, my week is typically divided between clinical time and studio time. Most of the week is dedicated to art practice however. For me, I’m constantly sourcing ideas for new work. So even when I am engaged in a more clinical headspace, I am on some level negotiating those experiences into artistic concepts. This balance between life as a therapist and life as an artist was previously more of a struggle for me since both identities were very fully formed. But as I’ve gotten older and have had a more reflective distance out of the city, I can see how they inform one another and how it’s possible to be more integrated creatively. My studio is positioned facing the Sangre de Christo Mountains, which are the lowest subrange of the Rockies. So the light is spectacular. Although natural light is not necessary for my work itself, I think it’s necessary for the quality of my experience in the studio. I am in the high desert at about 7k ft elevation, so the surrounding land is desert sage, piñon pine and juniper. I try to integrate a short yoga practice into my day, have morning coffee, and tend to work in long stretches because the physical materials I’m working with dry out very quickly. My digital work can happen anywhere and I tend to bring my ipad around with me just in case I want to capture something more spontaneously. When it’s warm in the spring/summer, I like to work outside. Because of the scale of my work, I tend to have to stand on stools or ladders to access hard-to-reach parts of the composition. Moving around a lot while working is key – when I was younger, working on large paintings or murals, I learned this the hard way and damaged my shoulder from a prolonged posture. I try to keep my upper body strong so that I can work in a very physical way.
Which experiences have impacted your work as an artist?
As an art therapist I’m utterly biased in the answering of this question. All of our lived experiences combined inform our present state and therefore our work as artists. I think my work today is truly a product of every day I’ve been alive. But in a more granular sense, my most recent experiences in health care, specifically as a front-line mental healthcare worker in NYC during Covid in early 2020, have forged a new relationship to concepts of shared human experiences such as grief, loss, existential despair or awakening. I’ve had the unique experience in life of sitting with many people and their families at end-of-life. This is a window into raw and visceral emotion and also brings up a lot of personal questions. I am not claiming to have any easy-to-digest answers, but I will say that I’ve learned to appreciate my own innate curiosity and that this is reflected in my artist practice. I see my hospital experiences in my material choices, for instance plaster and gauze. I also see my experiences of connection to the land in my textural choices. I think about my family’s ancestry a lot – particularly how intergenerational wisdom is transferred and manifested over time. Like so many people, I am a total mash up. I connect to my Scottish/Celtic, Jewish/Austrian, Indigenous Nova Scotian and Finnish/Scandinavian aspects of my heritage and see the through lines, however many generations removed, in their strong valuing of land and identity. I bring a feminist lens to all of my work and I admire the lineage of other women both in my family and community that have come before me and have transformed hardship into creative practice.
How has social media impacted your art career?
I have appreciated the ability to connect with other artists and transcend geographic boundaries. I definitely think of social media as a valuable tool. I also appreciate the opportunity to document and archive my work in real time. I’ve been able to identify a lot of like-minded artists and have subsequently identified opportunities for showing work and collaboration which has been a fueling aspect to my career.
What are your future goals and aspirations?
I am hoping to complete my sculptural painting series in 2023 and would love love love to find an opportunity to show all of this work together. So far, the works have been exhibited individually, which is great. However, I think there is a more powerful narrative to see so many sculptural paintings installed in the same space- where the viewer can really be in relationship to the work in a physical sense. I also recently launched the Taos Abstract Artist Collective (TAAC), with my two creative partners here in New Mexico and we have been curating exhibitions and developing exciting community partnerships. This past fall we launched a virtual studio visit series called TAAC TALKS with the help of my partner, who is a videographer. Living in New Mexico, where you can’t simply take the subway to visit another artist’s studio space, we’ve had to conceptualize a compelling format to present the intimate nature of individual artist studios and artist practice. The series has been an exciting success and we have talks planned through 2023. My goals are to keep evolving as an artist. To not get too comfortable or formulaic in my work and to honor my own experience of curiosity around meaning making.
Website: www.laurendanasmithart.com
Instagram: @laurendanasmithart