Defense Mechanism

source: highlike

Work: Damia Smith create pieces which physically and mentally engage the individuals who are wearing them. Each object attaches to a specific part of the body and limits the mobility of that area. The person who is wearing the device reacts to this incapacitating factor by struggling constantly to overcome it. This physical burden weighs on her body and mind, which makes her feel trapped within the object. These devices are not easily identifiable and retain qualities of clothing, corrective braces, traps, and living organisms. She has based these pieces on her own feelings of bodily and psychological inability, which are then translated into physical manifestations. Another individual can react to the devices and have some understanding of her situation. Her research for these pieces encompasses a wide variety of material including: psychiatric devices, prosthetics, medical instruments, parasites, medieval armor, restraining devices, African cultural masks, and shamanistic ritual costumes. The materials used to create the pieces work together to form a contrasting dialogue which makes the pieces more enigmatic and indefinable. She wants to physically involve the viewer in the objects by allowing them to touch the rich, varying textures on the pieces and imagining themselves wearing them. The devices themselves are hybrid objects with elements from multiple sources, such as clothing, armor, and cages. The wearers are converted into cyborgs, hybrid beings part human part machine, when they put on the devices. When the participants become more than human they become different from the rest of the population. The performers become fantastical creatures with debilitating devices attached to them. This becomes a metaphor for people in society with cultural, physical, or psychological differences that mark them as different from the rest of the population.
Photographer: Beatriz Parra
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source: glassfiction

Kansas artist and metalsmith Damia Smith states, “I create pieces which physically and mentally engage the individuals who are wearing them.” Which is only half true, because she also physically and mentally engages the individuals who are looking at them. Visit her site for a large body of amazing work!
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source: craftalliance

Damia Smith graduated from Southern Illinois University Edwardsville with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in metalsmithing and Bachelor of Science in Art Education.

She has shown her metal work both locally and nationally in several juried exhibitions. Most recently, one of her vessels was on display in Form, Fabricate, and Forge, an exhibition at Southern Illinois University Carbondale. She has also received several awards, including Award of Excellence from the Jacoby Art Center and a Purchase Award from the SIUE Student Art Competition.

Damia Smith graduated from Southern Illinois University Edwardsville with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in metalsmithing and Bachelor of Science in Art Education.

She has shown her metal work both locally and nationally in several juried exhibitions. Most recently, one of her vessels was on display in Form, Fabricate, and Forge, an exhibition at Southern Illinois University Carbondale. She has also received several awards, including Award of Excellence from the Jacoby Art Center and a Purchase Award from the SIUE Student Art Competition.