Ned Smyth

(Off View)

Ned Smyth is best known for his large-scale public art works, of which he has executed over thirty since 1977. Smyth rose to prominence at the time as a part of the Pattern and Decoration movement, a reactionary American art movement that emerged in the 1970s in response to the rise of Minimalism and Conceptualism. P&D Movement artists drew their primary influences from 1960s liberation politics, early feminism, and the recognition of traditional African, Middle Eastern, and Asian art practices. 

Smyth and his contemporaries incorporated elements with an emphasis on pattern and all-over decoration—traditionally secondary aspects of artmaking and virtually absent from the works being produced at the time—into large-scale paintings, fiber and textile works, and public sculptures. Smyth’s work marries these highly traditional decorative forms with hard edged geometric forms, often tying the two together through the inclusion of naturally-derived materials including stone and glass. 

Exhibitions of Smyth’s work have been held at Landcraft Garden Foundation, Mattituck; Hessel Museum of Art, Bard College, Annandale-on-Hudson; and Museum Moderner Kunst Stiftung Ludwig, Vienna among others.