Rock Classic: Adam Parker Smith’s whimsical approach squeezes out satire from classical sculptures
Always, there is a “na voice” in my mind saying ‘This could be a disaster. ‘”
Smith’s population in the northern California town of Arcata: 18,000. His parents own a popular bicycle shop and live in Apple Orchard. From what we all know, it was an idyllic childhood, with the lack of northern art education and culture, much of the economy revolved around growing and selling cannabis.
“That’s really the only problem,” Smith said. “I went to a small public school and didn’t have a lot of infrastructure for creative development.”
But Smith’s parents were wise. Early on, they investigated the fact that Smith liked to make art and he was good at it. “Once I hold a pencil, that’s what I want to do,” Smith said. Smith admitted that he “may become cliché” about his art beginnings. He found that “never had any critical moments”, “Aha! I’m an artist!” But there was encouragement and joyful dribbling.
He remembers messing up at a friend’s house, asking for a pen and a pencil. His friends don’t want to doodle, but his mom yelled at him: “Give him some paper and pencils! He will one day become a famous artist.”
“I remember thinking, ‘Oh, Jaz, I have to make this happen.'”
Smith told her this story before the friend’s mother died a few years ago, and she had been in a long time
Forgot, thanks to her: “You may be responsible for my trajectory.”
A small moment like this can be said to be an artist. But this is also an alchemy power that cannot be explained completely in human language. Did Smith become an artist because he was good at art? Or is he becoming an artist because he thinks he is good at it? Sometimes, when we grow up and think that we are a destiny for the sake of fate, other roads quickly disappear. Does Smith’s path change when an adult thinks he is a carpenter, tech CEO or flower shop? Children’s natural skills (whether cursed or blessings) usually pave our yellow brick path.
Given his young instinct, Smith did what he thought he needed to do: Go to graduate school to draw. But after the first year and the “destructive criticism of fifty people”, the tide changed. The professor actually came to his studio and said, “You shouldn’t paint.”
Not that he is not good at painting. He is skilled. But he had nothing to say. “I think when a person has too many technical facilities, they rely on them in the knee way, automatically, and don’t think deeply about what they are doing,” Smith said. “No struggle, no risk.”
For Smith, the job he found that he attracted most was “real gambling” and claimed to be “real struggle.” Always, there is a “na voice” in my mind saying ‘This could be a disaster. ‘”
He decided to go in a different direction. Instead of painting, he used the models he drew from the show to perform and asked his friends and collaborators to contribute to model-based painting. This is his advanced thesis program, and things finally hit it.
“This situation informs the rest of my practice,” he said. “Many of the works in my exhibitions are not actually fabricated by me. I work in a collaborative nature to some extent, in most cases I do.”
Let’s go back to Crush, Smith’s sculpture. Inspired by Italy for a year, “infiltrated and absorbed”, they start from the original marble, cut from the Carrara quarry in Carrara, an Italian city known for its blue-gray marble.
If you think about it in a periodic way, [my sculptures] A little bit back to their origins. ”
