Cauleen Smith
American, born 1967
Conduct Your Blooming
INV-2383
Cauleen Smith
American, born 19672016
Conduct Your Blooming
Cauleen Smith American, born 1967 →21st Centurytextilecotton
Date
2016
Medium
Seven banners: polyester, sequin-dot fabric, felt, cotton, and thread
Dimensions
142.3 × 381 cm (56 × 150 in.); 106.7 × 96.6 cm (42 × 38 in.); 73.7 × 142.3 cm (29 × 56 in.); 106.7 × 94 cm (42 × 37 in.); 73.7 × 142.3 cm (29 × 56 in.); 106.7 × 94 cm (42 × 37 in.); 139.7 × 279.4 cm (55 × 110 in.)
Museum
Art Institute of Chicago
Location
Chicago, IL
Credit
Ann M. Vielehr Prize Fund, The Neil G. Bluhm Contemporary Art Matching Fund Initiative, Mr. and Mrs. Frank G. Logan Endowment, Laura Slobe Memorial Prize, and Jacob and Bessie Levy Art Encouragement funds
Cauleen Smith has developed a lyrical visual practice across diverse media. She often proposes speculative narratives in her work, imagining new ways to embody and approach black identity that foster agency rather than oppression.
Smith produced her first group of hand-sewn banners in the summer of 2015. She populated them with the famous closing line from a Gwendolyn Brooks poem, “Conduct your blooming / in noise and the whip / of the whirlwind.” Smith and her friends and artist-peers mobilized them during the collectively organized Black Love Procession through Chicago’s Bronzeville in an effort to foster love and positivity. The words and symbols Smith features on her banners bear witness to issues of prejudice, racism, and people’s inability to understand one another.
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