‘Fragments of a Faith Forgotten’: the nonconformist art of Harry Smith
A unique exhibit is displaying the compelling artworks by Harry Smith, the late artist, filmmaker, musicologist, collector, and radical nonconformist hailing from Portland, Oregon. Best known for his compendium of song recordings, the Anthology of American Folk Music, the visionary polymath helped popularise the American folk scene through the 1960s but ventured far and wide throughout his 68-year existence.
Born in 1923, Smith surfed on a Dada aftershock, joining the likes of Andy Warhol to define 20th-century bohemia. Sitting at the very heart of the post-war avant-garde movement, Smith wore many hats, finding fame as a filmmaker and musicologist while cherishing his identity as a painter.
Beyond these roles, he was an ardent follower of the occult and other esoteric philosophies, imbuing his expressive works with alchemical and cosmological fibre. Smith’s insatiable curiosity led him to amass extraordinary collections, including records, Seminole textiles, string figures, Ukrainian Easter (Pysanky) eggs, and even the world’s most extensive paper aeroplane compilation.
One could spin a yarn for many an hour over this extraordinary individual, but now we’re all acquainted, I turn your attention to a current exhibition titled Fragments of a Faith Forgotten. Ongoing at the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York City, the exhibition is a comprehensive introduction to Smith’s life and work, featuring paintings, drawings, designs, experimental films, sound recordings, and examples of Smith’s collecting exploits.
Collated in partnership with artist Carol Bove, Fragments of a Faith Forgotten poses a fresh and inspired means of exploring twentieth-century American cultural histories. “At the Whitney, we strive to create exhibitions that are as innovative as the artists they present,” says Scott Rothkopf, Nancy and Steve Crown Family Chief Curator and incoming Alice Pratt Brown Director of the Whitney Museum, in a press statement. “Fragments of a Faith Forgotten is one such show, bringing to life the visionary world of Harry Smith as a total installation brilliantly conceived by the artist Carol Bove.”
“Vitally, Harry Smith brought to light and wrestled with—sometimes imperfectly—facets of America’s rich histories, tracing and sharing underappreciated veins of culture often invisible to mainstream society,” Elisabeth Sussman, Curator at the Whitney Museum of American Art, adds. “Smith followed his own path through American culture, revealing more about this country, its arts, and its diverse creative communities than nearly any other artist of his time.”
Below, we offer a snapshot of some of the artworks, artefacts and experiences available at the Whitney Museum in this unique exhibition. The exhibition closes on January 28th and is free to all visitors. For more information, visit the museum’s website here.
![Harry Smith, Algo Bueno [Jazz Painting], c. 1948–49. Lightbox projection from 35mm slide of lost original painting, 27 7/8 × 28 in. (55.6 × 71.1 cm)](https://faroutmagazine.co.uk/static/uploads/1/2024/01/Harry-Smith-Algo-Bueno-Jazz-Painting-c.-1948%E2%80%9349.-Far-Out-Magazine.jpg)
