Sarah Stefana Smith: Thresholds of Dissent

March 29-May 12, 2024
Common Ground Gallery

Thresholds of Dissent brings together a constellation of works that consider material and material life. The exhibition constructs various points of contact between multi-textural wall objects and installations and two-dimensional sculptural drawings — to consider networks, dissonances, connectivities, and relationships through unmarked territories and care. 

About the Artist

Sarah Stefana Smith is an artist-scholar based between western Massachusetts and Washington, D.C. who works predominantly in photography, sculpture, and installation. Through the visual forms of archives, repurposed materials, and historical narratives, Smith considers questions of repair and disrepair and lines of demarcation around difference, human, and species.

Smith has exhibited nationally and internationally and has held residencies with MASS MoCA, The Walkaway House, University of Pittsburgh, the Creatives Project with the Center for Humanities, DCAC Sparkplug, and the Vermont Studio Center, among others. They have written for a number of  publications, including “Drain: Journal of Art and Culture,” “Bmore Arts Magazine,” “Journal of Women & Performance” (2018), “The Black Scholar” (2019), and “Handbook on Race in the Arts in Education” (2018).

Smith received their Ph.D. from the University of Toronto and their M.F.A. from Goddard College. They’re currently an Assistant Professor of Gender Studies at Mount Holyoke College. 

Learn more at www.sarahstefanasmith.com 

Image: Sarah Smith, “Flag to the Abyss” (detail), 2022-2023