Jo Smail (born 1943) is an American artist born and educated in Durban, South Africa.[1] Smail emigrated to the United States in 1985.[2][3]

Early life and education

Smail was born and raised in Durban, South Africa. There she received a degree in English and in history. After having three children, she attended art school.[3]

Career

Her work in painting, collage and drawing has been described as "poetic annotations."[2] Her series of works, “Mongrel Collection,” from 2018 incorporate fragments of printed fabric, drawing and pigment prints mounted on eccentrically shaped MDF board.[4]

Her retrospective exhibition, Flying with Remnant Wings, was presented at the Baltimore Museum of Art in 2021.[5][6] She has collaborated on numerous works with the artist William Kentridge during the early years of the 2000s.[3]

She has received reviews in the New York Times,[7] Baltimore Magazine,[5] Art In America,[8] Hyperallergic,[2] Artforum,[4] among other publications.

In 1996, a significant amount of her work was destroyed in a fire at her studio in the Clipper Mill Industrial Park in Baltimore.[2][6] She lost 25 years worth of work in the fire that engulfed her studio. After the fire, her work developed an autobiographical tendency.[9]

Smail taught at the Johannesburg College of Art, the University of the Witwatersrand and at the Maryland Institute College of Art.[9]

Collections

Her work is included in the permanent collections of the Baltimore Museum of Art,[10] the Johannesburg Art Museum,[11] the National Gallery of South Africa[11] among other venues. In 1996 she received a Pollock-Krasner Foundation Fellowship.[11]

Personal life

Smail is married to Julien Davis, a research scientist and photographer.[2] In 2000, she suffered a stroke and lost the ability to walk and speak. She continued to make art beginning with drawings and paintings that depicted "silence and sounds that became a new kind of language." She later regained her mobility and the ability to speak.[3]

References

  1. ↑ "Jo Smail". Jo Smail (website). Retrieved 27 June 2023.
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 Nemett, Barry (9 May 2020). "An Artist as Resilient as She Is Joyous". Hyperallergic. Retrieved 27 June 2023.
  3. 1 2 3 4 Kirkman, Rebekah (30 September 2015). "Starting from Scratch: Considerate of every mark, painter Jo Smail lets go of what she thinks she knows". The Baltimore Sun. Retrieved 27 June 2023.
  4. 1 2 Clark, Andy Martinelli. "Jo Smail". Artforum. Retrieved 27 June 2023.
  5. 1 2 King, Matthew (2 November 2020). "Jo Smail's Visual Poetry Transforms Loss Into Joy". Baltimore Magazine. Retrieved 27 June 2023.
  6. 1 2 "Jo Smail with Louis Block". The Brooklyn Rail. July 2020. Retrieved 27 June 2023.
  7. ↑ Cotter, Holland (10 February 2006). "Art in Review: Jo Smail". The New York Times. Retrieved 27 June 2023.
  8. ↑ Hirsh, Jennie (27 March 2012). "Jo Smail". Art in America. Retrieved 27 June 2023.
  9. 1 2 "Studio Visit: Jo Smail". Goya Contemporary. Retrieved 27 June 2023.
  10. ↑ "Collaboration #9 (Jo Smail with William Kentridge)". Baltimore Museum of Art. Retrieved 27 June 2023.
  11. 1 2 3 "Jo Smail". Art in Embassies, U.S. Department of State. Retrieved 27 June 2023.
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