Education
New York University.
New York University.
He trained at Cooper Union, New York University, and under Winifred Mason. Inspired by surrealism, biomorphicism, and primitivism.. dynamic in its size and form. Many of his pieces were extremely large, and designed to be worn by avant-garde dancers.
This influenced his style.
Of his own work, he said:
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.
lieutenant is one of the basic inspirations in creating form.
They moved to New York City when he was three. As an adult, Smith worked in Manhattan"s Greenwich Village, running a shop there from 1946 until 1979 (shortly before his death). Smith was a gay African-American, and as a result was subject to attacks shortly after his store opened.
A fan of jazz and modern dance, he was personally acquainted with musicians of the period including Lena Horne, Harry Belafonte, and Talley Beatty.
During his life, Smith"s work was featured in Vogue and Harper"s Bazaar, and exhibited at the Museum of Contemporary Crafts. Posthumously, Smith"s work was the subject of an exhibition at the Brooklyn Museum in 2008-2011, and is held in the permanent collection of the Cooper Hewitt Museum, Museum of Art and Design, and Boston Museum of Fine Arts.