Iconic Black Designers: Art Smith

Happy Black History Month!!! This is our favorite time of the year to blog, a time that we dedicate to researching and writing about iconic Black Americans. This year we are sharing with you Black designers. As designers ourselves, we are always looking to the past for inspiration and this was the perfect time to do some digging to find people who inspire us with our own craft. We hope you enjoy this series and learn something new this month.

Art Smith (1917-1982)

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Art Smith was one of the leading modernist jewelers of the mid-twentieth century, and one of the only Afro-Caribbean people working in his field. Smith was born in Cuba to Jamaican parents and grew up in Brooklyn, New York. He studied sculpture at Cooper Union and trained under Winifred Mason.

"A piece of jewelry is in a sense an object that is not complete in itself. Jewelry is a ‘what is it?’ until you relate it to the body. The body is a component in design just as air and space are. Like line, form, and color, the body is a material to work with. It is one of the basic inspirations in creating form." ~Art Smith

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Smith's work was inspired by surrealism, biomorphicism, and primitivism , the pieces were dynamic in size and form. Although the pieces were massive in scale, they remained lightweight and wearable.  Smith designed cuff links for  Duke Ellington and a brooch for Eleanor Roosevelt.  During the 1950's, his work was featured in Vogue and Harper's Bazaar.  You could find him with the likes of Lena Horne, Harry Belafonte, and  James Baldwin. He also owned his own shop in Greenwich Village for 30 years.

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Until 2009, the Brooklyn Museum had an exhibition called From the Village to Vogue, where 21 pieces of the modernist jewelry was on display. All of the pieces were sterling silver and because of their grand size, they could hang on a wall just as easily as they could be worn. 

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Smith passed away in 1982 and his estate went to his sister, and then later was passed to his partner, Charles Russel, who donated it to the Brooklyn Museum. I'm so sad that I missed the exhibit at the Brooklyn Museum by a few years, but there is so much information on the web and images of his jewelry. Hopefully, I can catch an exhibit soon. In the meanwhile, if you want to learn more about Art Smith you can check out an article here.

Thank you Mr. Smith for your crafstmanship to the field of jewelry design. Your work is truly an inspiration and your legacy continues to live on.

Be Blessed! Be Free! Be Fashionable!

 ~Chris