From On the River
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Allison Smith was born in Manassas, Virginia in 1972. She has received a BA degree in psychology from the New School for Social Research, a BFA degree from Parsons School of Art and Design, and an MFA from the Yale University School of Art.
Allison Smith’s work varies in material, but it fairly constant in terms of ideas. She explores and investigates “the cultural phenomenon of historical reenactment and the role of craft in the construction of national identity.” She brings together historical knowledge as well as imagination to create a new way of looking at an old subject. She also explores the fine line between art and craft. This idea is also coupled well with the anthropological idea of craft and art, and how something can have a specific use and also be formal and imaginative. Most of her works detail the idea of “fiction based on fact.”
Some of her noted pieces are The Donkey, The Jackass, and The Mule, which is both sculptural as well as a performance. This work deals with a protest against the exclusion of women from the fifteenth amendment
Another notable piece is Hobby Horse. This was another piece that utilized both performance as well as sculptural mediums. It was realized when the artist found a small rocking horse at a county fair. Smith created a larger than life rocking horse and created a Civil war costume for her to wear. As she rode the rocking horse, she sang the patriotic Civil war song, “When Johnny Comes Marching Home,” which was based on an anti-war Irish ballad.
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