Shinique Smith Untitled (Whistler's Mother) 2009 clothing, fabric, ribbon, rope, twine, chair, wall and collage [installation view]

Yvon Lambert's current show, Shinique Smith's "Ten Times Myself", offers a splendid swirl of work in a mix of media and related to what appears to be the current Great Recession-era vogue for "austerity art", but in this instance the found objects have been assembled into compositions as formal as the figurative art of the masters.

Smith's "(Whistler's Mother)" is clearly more than just an arrangement, since she's bouncing off of Whistler's "Arrangement in Gray and Black: Portrait of the Artist's Mother". Her own [disquisition on the feminine principle?] replaces Whistler's dark, sober canvas with a robust baroque effigy and an extravagant palette, fully-modelled in its own way, yet in the softest shapes.

Singling out "Mother" may be misleading, but none of the works in this show are abstractions independent of outside references; the titles only begin to suggest how their exuberant imagery relates to a "real" world reassembled inside the artist's mind and informing the confident hand which assembled them.

Barry and I first encountered the artist and her work five years ago when we talked to her inside her space near the top of the Woolworth Building during an LMCC open studio weekend. It's been exciting watching her work pop up all over ever since, always attracting more big fans.

Shinique Smith And the world don't stop 2009 ink, acrylic, enamel, fabric, ephemera and collage on canvas over wood panel, two panels 96" x 120" x 4"

[detail]

[detail of "And it feels like love", a work not reproduced here in its entirety]