PREVIEW:Kiki-Smith Flight

For over forty years, Kiki Smith has navigated the art world not by following trends, but by spinning a vast, interconnected web of her own. She is a rare breed of multidisciplinary artist whose restless curiosity refuses to be confined to a single medium. From the heavy permanence of bronze sculpture to the delicate translucency of stained glass, and spanning printmaking, drawing, photography, and tapestry, Smith’s diverse output could easily feel fragmented in lesser hands.

By Dimitris Lempesis
Photo: Galerie Lelong Archive

This year marks a monumental milestone in her illustrious career. Her solo exhibition, “Flight,” at Galerie Lelong, represents her tenth show with the gallery, celebrating a rich 25-year collaboration. It is a poignant distillation of her visual universe, bringing together bronze sculptures, two expansive stained-glass windows, intimate drawings, and an imposing large-scale print.

To understand “Flight,” one must understand the thread that Smith has been weaving for more than four decades. Her practice insists that humans, animals, and plants are inextricably linked in a single chain of existence, stretching effortlessly from the microscopic reality of a cell to the dizzying infinity of the cosmos.

Smith’s inspiration is entirely democratic, found just as easily in the mundane as in the high-minded. Her visual vocabulary is drawn from the textured bark of birch trees outside her home and the resilient pigeons of Manhattan’s public parks, as well as the steady rhythm of a full moon and the distant glow of the Milky Way. This imagery is further enriched by her eclectic literary and scientific musings, which range from Lewis Carroll and the poetry of Emily Dickinson to anatomy textbooks, ancient myths, and fairy tales.

When creating, Smith operates with a raw, undeniable authenticity. She has famously noted that she crafts her narratives with “utter sincerity”—simply because she cannot do otherwise. The result is a growing, living mythos that only becomes richer, deeper, and more urgent with the passage of time.

The title of her latest exhibition, “Flight”, hints at liberation, perspective, and the ethereal. Therefore, it comes as no surprise that avian iconography takes center stage. In this body of work, birds are not merely passive elements of the landscape; they are heavy with layers of complex, symbolic meaning. Majestic eagles represent power and the daunting weight of freedom, while messenger doves evoke peace and communication between disparate realms. Meanwhile, clairvoyant owls stand as sentinels of ancient wisdom, navigating the deep darkness of the subconscious.

As has always been the case in Smith’s iconography, the natural world serves as a psychological mirror for the human condition. By projecting our deepest internal landscapes—our vulnerabilities, unspoken fears, latent desires, and loftiest dreams—onto these winged creatures, Smith bridges the gap between the human ego and the wild world.

Through the heavy gleam of bronze and the radiant, shifting light of her stained-glass windows, “Flight “ invites viewers to look upward and inward simultaneously. It is a masterful reminder that we are not separate from nature, but merely another knot in Kiki Smith’s grand, eternal tapestry.

Photo: Kiki Smith, Sungrazer VIII, 2019, Bronze,Edition of 3 + 1 AP, 272 x 122 x Galerie Lelong 122 cm (107 3/16 x 48 1/16 x 48 1/16 in), © Kiki Smith, Courtesy the artist and Galerie Lelong

Info: Galerie Lelong, 13, rue de Téhéran, Paris, France, Duration: 21/5-11/7/2026, Days & Hours: Tue-Fri 10:30-18:00, Sat 14:00-18:30, www.galerie-lelong.com/