LUXURIOUS DISASTER PAINTINGS
A 21ST CENTURY TALE OF LOVE, FAME & TRAGEDY
Confronting 20th Century nostalgia, wealth, opulence, capitalism and art history squarely in the face, Taylor Smith creates newly constructed paintings reminiscent of pop art's most noted works. Referencing the dark commentary of Andy Warhol’s 1962-1964 Disaster Series, Smith creates a loosely connected group of artworks which take as their subjects luxury designer brands, street art, consumer products, iconic pop art imagery, the human body, prescription drugs and glitched computer data corruption. Smith appropriates found images from art history and popular culture, often altering familiar icons to appear broken and glitched, as if a computer hard drive is failing. The artist has referred to these paintings as recycled American myths.
Smith appropriates source material from her personal experiences, social media, pop culture, art history, luxury brands and found commercial packaging by using paint, screen print, and precious metal leaf as a means to create her paintings. Smith fuses separate worlds together — the explosive and visual power of wealth, fashion and popular culture contrasted with memory, nostalgia and a swiftly changing society. Smith contrasts the highs and lows, the tragedies of our time, and ones that are expressed in promises of the American dream with the status symbols of the wealthy and presents them as 21st Century history painting.