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ISSUE SIX

A COLLECTION OF IMAGES, PROJECTS, AND THOUGHTS FROM THE STUDIO OF PHILLIP K. SMITH III

What. When. Where

2022-2023 Exhibition and Honoring at Palm Springs Art Museum

Palm Springs Art Museum, Palm Springs, CA

“Three Half Lozenges” Unveiled

The Newark Museum of Art, Newark, NJ

Smith is currently working with Adam Lerner, the new director of the Palm Springs Art Museum, on a significant exhibition of his work scheduled to open in late 2022. In addition, with the Palm Springs Art Museum’s recent decision to hold off on a large gathering gala in 2022, the future Art Party 2023 gala fundraiser, aligned with the opening of his exhibition, will honor Phillip K. Smith, III.

2022-2023 Exhibition at the Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art (SMoCA)

Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art, Scottsdale, AZ

Smith will be exhibiting a singular, large scale reflection and light-based installation in the main gallery at SMOCA. He is currently in the final planning stages of the installation, working directly with the Museum’s Director and Chief Curator, Jennifer McCabe.

Smith featured in Palm Springs Life’s Desert Living Edition

September 2021 Issue

Titled “Into the Light”, Steven Biller’s article featured in Palm Springs Life’s magazine dedicates a 10-page overview of Smith’s lightbased artwork and installations, from Lucid Stead to Coachella to Desert X to recent work.

https://www.palmspringslife.com/

Commissioned by The Newark Museum of Art as a permanent installation within their collection, Three Half Lozenges was unveiled publicly on October 9th, 2021 with an audience of over 1000 people from the community during an open-air block party celebration. It was a powerful and exciting beginning to an artwork that will light up the Museum’s facade every night of every day from here forward.

www.newarkmuseumart.org

Sofia

Enriquez “Cambiando” &

Burzeen Contractor

“Perpetual Light” Exhibition at PKS3 Studio

PKS3 Studio, Palm Desert, CA

NOV 12 – DEC 3, 2021

The exhibition opening for “Cambiando” and “Perpetual Light” was well attended, with over 300 guests participating in Sofia Enriquez and Burzeen Contractor’s largest solo shows. With overwhelming support, over ¾ of Enriquez’s work was sold. There was so much demand for Contractor’s larger 60” x 60” Mystic Light series that several additional pieces were printed and sold post-opening

For more information, contact the studio arlene@pks3.com

Special Thanks to:

The Newark Museum of Art (Linda Harrison Tricia Bloom, Catherine Evans, Tim Wintemberg, David May, Andreina Castillo, Casey Daurio), Sean Kizy and Neon Fab Studios, the entire team at FabHaus, Jay Hyma (for that drive across country), Palm Springs Life (Frank Jones and Steven Biller), The Art Collective, and the artists Burzeen Contractor and Sofia Enriquez.

Credits:

Photography: Lance Gerber Studio @lance.gerber

Graphic Design: Mariana Pariani @girlpilot Assistant Designer: Elsie Morales

Photo by © Bryon Summers

Recently on view at Metropolitan Park in Arlington, VA, Arc Line Arc, 2012, and Line to Circle, 2012 are now available for private appointments in Indio, CA.

Three Half Lozenges

46’-0” x 33’-6” (each of the three windows: 10’-0” x 33’-6”)

Existing historic windows, alupoly, aluminum, LED lighting, electronic components, unique color choreography.

Commissioned by The Newark Museum of Art as a permanent installation within their collection, Three Half Lozenges is a newly revealed light-based installation by artist Phillip K. Smith, III—his first permanent work on the East Coast. Forever changing the perception of the Museum from dusk into the night, this installation further defines the Museum’s presence and importance within Newark and the surrounding area.

As evidenced in past projects such as Lucid Stead, 2013 (Joshua Tree, CA) and Detroit Skybridge, 2018 (Detroit, MI), Smith uses the scale, context, and site-specificity of architecture as a canvas for shifting light. Often using forgotten or unused architectural spaces, Smith redefines these forgotten elements into inspired lit beacons within the locations they are sited. In Three Half Lozenges, Smith uses the formerly back painted glass of three existing, historic, two-story high windows that define the 1920’s limestone facade of The Newark Museum of Art. Using the division and layout of the window panes as a canvas for light, the form of the windows links directly to Smith’s ongoing series of lozenge-shaped Lightworks he’s been creating since 2013.

Located within the context of Downtown Newark and its developing Arts District, the installation is uniquely color choreographed by Smith as a precisely paced, full-spectrum work experienced from the streets and the surrounding Washington Park. Shifting from full fields of color to gradating lines and curves, the three half-lozenge shaped windows operate as a monumental light-based triptych at the scale of architecture. During the day, the façade remains its true, historical self. At sunset, the windows slowly emerge as full color, reconfiguring one’s experience of The Newark Museum of Art, Washington Park, and the city itself.

Three Half Lozenges on the facade of The Newark Museum of Art seen from the corner of Washington and Central Ave. in Newark, NJ.

Three Half Lozenges activates the facade of the Museum with slowly changing color choreography created by Smith that emerges at dusk and runs into the late evening.

The historic two-story high windows on the Museum façade provide the perfect canvas and armature for light, casting its glow across this rapidly changing city. “

”

—Phillip K. Smith III

West Hollywood

Parallel Perpendicular installation nears completion at West Hollywood Park, CA

Six months after Smith released Lucid Stead out into the world in October 2013, he exhibited his monolithic, reflective, and color-shifting installation, Reflection Field, at the 2014 edition of the Coachella Valley Arts and Music Festival. Immediately following Coachella, Smith responded to a Request for Qualifications initiated by the City of West Hollywood’s public art department to create a singular, iconic public artwork as a focal point within the experience of the soon-to-bereimagined West Hollywood Park. In the Fall of 2014, Smith was selected as a finalist and presented his initial iteration of Parallel Perpendicular In early 2015, Smith was officially commissioned by the City, and the artwork was fully designed, engineered and approved.

Fast forward six and a half years to the Summer of 2021, through a massive West Hollywood Park redesign by Rios Clemente Hale (now RIOS), the construction of a multi-story sports building to house all of the group sports formerly located in the park, add in a worldwide pandemic, and we get to the installation of Parallel Perpendicular Starting in July, PKS3 Studio completed the installation of the sculpture’s five free-standing reflective volumes. During the day, the mirrored surfaces reflect and collage the park’s old growth trees, changing sky, and surrounding City. By night, the reflective surfaces transform into shifting fields of floating color combining and echoing in space. This sculpture will be Smith’s first permanent public work in the Los Angeles area and will be available for viewing 24/7 every day of the year (the color will emerge at dusk each day and will run until 2 am). Smith’s public work is located in the more intimate zone of the park just off of Robertson Boulevard, north of Melrose, and south of Santa Monica Boulevard; directly adjacent to Cesar Pelli’s iconic Pacific Design Center. As the park nears completion, stay tuned for more information on the unveiling of this significant artwork, anticipated to be in early 2022.