Art Smith Archive
name: label: Artist
content: Smith, Art, 1917-1982
label: Curator of an exhibition
content: Billops, Camille, 1933-2019
label: Names
content: Boatwright, Ruth Ellington, 1915-2004
label: Musician
content: Ellington, Duke, 1899-1974
label: Names
content: Primus, Pearl, (dancer), 1919-1994
topic: label: Topic
content: Jewelry -- Design
label: Topic
content: American studio craft movement
label: Topic
content: Art, Modern -- 20th century
label: Topic
content: African American art
label: Topic
content: African American artisans
label: Topic
content: African American artists
label: Topic
content: African American art museum curators
label: Topic
content: African American artists as teachers
creator: label: Artist
content: Smith, Art, 1917-1982
setName: label: See more items in
content: Art Smith Archive
abstract: label: Summary
content: Arthur (Art) Smith was one of the leading studio jewelry artists of the mid-twentieth century. Between 1946 and 1977, Arthur Smith worked out of his store, Art Smith in Greenwich Village, New York City creating commissions as well as modern designs for a diverse clientele, for wholesalers across the United States, and for inclusion in crafts and art exhibitions. During his life, Arthur's work was featured in numerous exhibitions across the United States. His legacy was also honored posthumously through additional exhibitions curated by artists, galleries, and museums, and other projects. This archival collection contains biographical materials, a significant amount of Smith's family papers, family photographs, photographs related to Art Smith Jewelry advertisements and exhibitions, original drawings and facsimiles of jewelry drawings and designs, exhibition materials and catalogues, correspondence, clippings about Arthur and jewelry advertisements, business papers, manuscript drafts, oral history interview transcripts and related biographical research materials collected by Charles Russell, Arthur's partner, while writing the biography "Art as Adornment: The Life and Work of Arthur George Smith." The collection provides insight into Arthur Smith's life and family, his work as a jewelry artist, and the preservation of his legacy.
bioghist: label: Biography
content: Arthur (Art) George Smith was born in Santa Lucia, Cuba to Jamaican parents James and Mary Smith (née Williams) on October 28, 1917. The couple and their adopted daughter, Ina, had migrated from Jamaica to Cuba for work. In 1918, James Smith left Cuba for Brooklyn, New York, where he served as an officer in Marcus Garvey's United Negro Improvement Association (UNIA). The family, Mary, Ina, and young Arthur joined him in 1920. Mary and James would later separate.  Arthur's mother and sister worked a series of domestic work and tutoring jobs to support the family as well as provide young Art with educational opportunities not traditionally experienced by Black people during the Great Depression.

Smith began to display a talent for fine arts while attending elementary school that continued to flourish in high school leading him a full scholarship to Cooper Union, a private college in New York focused on the study of fine art, architecture, and engineering. Smith was advised to focus on architecture because of the limited opportunities afforded to Black people in the fine arts. He instead chose to explore a variety of art forms and later recalled being most interested in sculpture and decorative arts. He graduated in 1940. The same year, the New Deal work program, National Youth Administration (later Junior Achievement, Inc) allowed Smith to teach youth art courses at the Children's Aid Society in Harlem. There he met Winifred Mason (Chenet), a pioneer in creating African American jewelry. In 1943, Mason hired, trained, and mentored Smith at her shop located in Greenwich Village - then an important enclave for artists, writers, and musicians. It was here that he learned how to transform metals into the wearable art that would come to define the Mid-century Modern jewelry movement.

In 1946, Smith left Mason to open his first shop on Cornelia Street in Little Italy in New York City, but he was forced to relocate because of racial discrimination and violence. He was chased and nearly hit by a white driver and his store's display window was broken twice. Smith opened his second store the following year at 140 W 4th Street in Greenwich Village. Smith initially shared the store, then known as Craft House, with Helen Cornélé Cuyjet (Nélé), an African American metalsmith and leather craftswoman. They shared this space for several years before parting ways. He renamed the store, Art Smith Jewelry after himself. Smith's jewelry was dynamic and noted for being lightweight, sinuous, and attentive to line and form. His earlier use of brass and copper enabled him to produce work using affordable materials while still creating unique custom designs. Employing and training up to four apprentices at a time from art schools, Smith was able to produce large quantities of product. His prolific output allowed him to sell his work to national retail stores and boutiques in New York City, Boston, Chicago, and San Francisco. His retail clients included Bloomingdales and Milton Heffling's Inc.

His diverse clientele came from the social scene of Greenwich Villages and nationwide colleges with affiliated art and/or jewelry programs and galleries. He possessed a strong Black client base that transversed multi-disciplinary Black arts scene including artists, writers, dancers, and musicians. Smith designed jewelry for major modern Black dance companies including the Pearl Primus Dance Company, Tally Beatty Dance Company, and Claude Marchant Dance Company. He also sold thousands of dollars-worth of jewelry to outlets such as the Afro-Arts Bazaar in Harlem, operated by Ina Cullen (widow of poet Countee Cullen), Etta Moten Barnett and Estelle Massey Osborn. He was a member of the Neal Salon, a social support network made up largely of Black gay artists and performers in New York City. His various networks included close friends such as choreographer Talley Beatty, visual artists Charles Sebree, Joyce Scott and Camille Billops, and actress Ruth Attaway, and acquaintances such as photographer Gordon Parks and writer Ralph Ellison.

By the 1950s, Smith's pieces were being featured in Harper's Bazaar, Vogue, and The New Yorker. Both African American community magazines, Jet and Opportunity published articles on his work. Two of his notable commissions include a brooch for First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt and cufflinks for Duke Ellington. Smith, a longtime Ellington fan, designed the cufflinks as commissioned by Ellington's sister, Ruth, with the first notes of his 1930 hit composition, "Mood Indigo." Smith was also a founding member of the Duke Ellington Society, a fan club that celebrated Ellington artistry and legacy. An avid jazz aficionado, Smith attended concert and dance performances frequently of his friends, associates, and patrons. He also was noted for creating work while listening to music. Jazz music was his muse, and he amassed a considerable music collection dedicated to the art form.

Through his notoriety and social circle, he gained opportunities to teach, create, exhibit and in some cases sell his work to several institutions. These include Morgan State College (now University located in Maryland), Staten Island Museum of Smith and Sciences, Brookfield Craft Center, and the Haystack Mountain School of Crafts (Maine). Smith was also featured in the first NEH-funded "National African American Crafts Jubilee" and the associated "Contemporary African American Crafts" exhibition both taking place in Memphis, TN. In 1979, Smith co-created a work of jewelry with visual artist Joyce Scott, that encapsulated both their respective styles.

Smith met his life partner, Charles Russell in 1973 at The Metropolitan, movie theater in Greenwich Village. Russell, who identified as a white bisexual man, remained his partner until end of Smith's life. Together, the couple moved to a loft in Soho where they often hosted their social events while showcasing Smith's famous jazz collection. By the late 1970s, Smith's health started to decline, and he was forced to close his shop. Smith transitioned to working out of their home on selective commissions. By 1979, the couple moved back to his native Brooklyn where Smith's sister, Ina (who was then in poor health) came to live with them. Smith died of heart failure on February 20, 1982. Charles remained close to Smith's niece Yvonne and sister Ina, the latter continued to live with Charles, as he moved to subsequent locations in New Jersey and Illinois until her death in 1995. Yvonne assisted Charles in managing Smith's estate until her death in 2002.
 
Smith's friend and collaborator, Camille Billops created "The Art Smith Project", a collaborative project including his partner, family, friends, and supporters to actively document and preserve his legacy, his process, and his art. The Project was dedicated to the documentation of Smith's work and process through photography of his jewelry and oral history interviews with his friends and former clients. This also entailed preserving Smith's archives in the Hatch-Billops Collection, Inc. Camille utilized the archive in the exhibition, "Arthur Smith: A Jeweler's Retrospective" at the Jamaica Arts Center in New York. For several years, Camille and Charles both managed requests from museums and galleries to exhibit and licensing of photographs of his work. In 2008, Charles donated nineteen pieces from the Art Smith store, with accompanying archival materials, his store sign and jewelry-making tools, to the Brooklyn Museum in New York.

Posthumously, several major exhibitions recognizing Smith's contribution to midcentury modernist jewelry include "Structure and Ornament: American Modernist Jewelry 1940-1960" at the Fifty-50 Gallery in New York in 1984; "Sculpture to Wear: Art Smith and his Contemporaries," at the Gansevoort Gallery in New York in 1998; "Messengers of Modernism: American Studio Jewelry 1940-1960" at the Montreal Museum of Decorative Arts in 1996; and "From the Village to Vogue: The Modernist Jewelry of Art Smith" at the Brooklyn Museum in 2008.

Charles Russell remained dedicated to his partner's legacy and family. With encouragement from Camille Billops, over the course of two decades, Charles wrote a biography of Art Smith's life. The resulting book, Art as Adornment: The Life and Work of Arthur George Smith, was published in 2016. Charles, with assistance of gallerist and artist manager Mark McDonald, continuing to maintain his personal collection and manage Smith's estate, including jewelry loans, and sales. Charles' personal collection of Smith materials along with an additional collection documentation "The Art Smith Project" maintained by the Hatch-Billops Collection, Inc. were donated to NMAAHC in 2018 and 2022 respectively.
label: Biographical Timeline
content: Biographical Timeline

1906  -- James August Smith and Mary Elizabeth Williams wed in Jamaica 

1914  -- James and Mary (Williams) Smith and their adopted daughter Ina, migrate from Jamaica to Santa Lucia, Cuba

October 28, 1917   -- Arthur George Smith is born in Santa Lucia, Cuba.

1920  -- Mary, Ina, and Arthur leave Cuba to settle in Brooklyn with James.

1931  -- As an 8th grader at Brooklyn P.S. No. 3, Arthur wins an ASPCA (American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals) poster contest. He later recalled this as one of the events that led him to decide to become an artist.  

1935 --  – Arthur attends Cooper Union Day School, he takes a broad array of classes, wanting to expose himself to as many artistic forms as possible.  He begins experimenting with three-dimensional art forms through sculpture and decorative design classes.

1936 ca. --  Arthur begins working with the National Youth Administration (NYA), painting public service signs for the Harlem youth program. While there, he meets noted theater set designer Perry Watkins from the Negro Playwrights Company. Arthur apprentices with Watkins for over a year.

1938 -- At a jazz performance in Harlem, Arthur meets dancer Talley Beatty, an emergent Black choreographer and dancer in Katherine Dunham's company. The two establish a lifelong friendship.  Arthur would later design jewelry for several of Beatty's performances as well as those of other Black modern dance companies.

1939  -- As a sophomore at Cooper Union, Art wins the New York World Fair architecture contest.

1940  -- Arthur graduates from Cooper Union with a degree in Advertising Design.

1941 -- Smith starts at the Children's Aid Society under the auspices of the Junior Achievement, Inc., an organization devoted to helping young adults with business pursuits.  While there, he meets Winifred Mason, a fellow African American jewelry designer. 

1943  -- Smith begins to work as an assistant for Winifred Mason in her store at 133 West 3rd Street in Greenwich Village. 

1946  -- Smith opens his first store at 37 Cornelia Street, an Italian neighborhood.  He also becomes involved with Craftsmen's Equity, an organization of professional workers in the field of ceramics, jewelry, textiles, and plastics. He becomes its president the following year.

1948  -- Talley Beatty invites Art to join the Neal Salon, a social support group for Black gay artists and musicians.  Art also publishes an article, "Jewelry Making is My Craft" in National Urban League magazine, Opportunity for the winter edition.

1950  -- Smith's work is featured in Vogue Magazine in the September issue.

1951  -- Smith is noted in the program book of the Pearl Primus Dance Company show, "Dark Rhythms," as having designed the jewelry for the production.

1953  -- Smith publishes an ad for his boutique, Art Smith in May issue of The New Yorker magazine.

1957  -- Arthur sells 70 pieces of jewelry to Bloomingdale's in New York City department store.

1958  -- Smith is injured in a car accident while on a trip .  He sustains injuries to his face, specifically his eye. His production slows until he recovers.

1959  -- Talley Beatty's "The Road of the Phoebe Snow" with Smith being a contributor to program.

1974 --  Smith accepts a summer teaching assignment at the Haystack Mountain School of Crafts located in Deer Isle, Maine. From December 1 through 20, he is also featured in The Gallery of Art at Morgan State College in Baltimore's "The Haystack Encounter".

1978  -- Samella Lewis, art historian, educator and artist, publishes her book, Art: African American, featuring both Art Smith and Camille Billops.

1979 -- In May, the 1st "National African American Crafts Conference & Jubilee" is held in Memphis, sponsored by Shelby State Community College. Smith is the exhibition and teaches a workshop in jewelry-making.  The following month, his work is featured in the Brookfield Craft Center 25th Anniversary Exhibit.

 1990  -- Camille Billops curates the exhibition "Arthur Smith: A Jeweler's Retrospective" at the Jamaica Arts Center, after creating the "Art Smith Project" honoring Arthur Smith's legacy.

2007 -- Charles donates Art Smith jewelry and archives to the Brooklyn Museum. 

2008 -- The Brooklyn Museum opens the exhibition, "From Brooklyn to Vogue: The Modernist Jewelry of Art Smith".

2016  -- Charles publishes biography of Art's life and career, Art as Adornment: The Life and Work of Arthur George Smith.
physdesc: label: Extent
content: 11 Cubic feet (23 boxes)
unitdate: label: Date
content: 1909-2010
label: Date
content: bulk 1930-1982
dataSource: label: Archival Repository
content: National Museum of African American History and Culture
identifier: label: Identifier
content: NMAAHC.A2018.110
objectType: label: Type
content: Collection descriptions
label: Type
content: Archival materials
arrangement: label: Arrangement
content: Series 1: Biographical Materials, 1909-2003


Subseries 1.1: Family Papers, 1909-2003


Subseries 1.2: Family Photographs, 1920-1995, undated 


Subseries 1.3: Personal Photographs, 1934-1982


Subseries 1.4: Personal Papers, circa 1942-1982

Series 2: Professional Activities, circa 1946-2003


Subseries 2.1: Business Records and Jewelry Designs, circa 1947-1980


Subseries 2.2: Professional Photographs of Jewelry and Art Smith, circa 1946-2003, undated 


Subseries 2.3: Exhibition Records, 1948-1981

Series 3: Advertisements and Periodicals, 1949-2008

Series 4: Legacy and Memorialization, 1982-2010


Subseries 4.1: Posthumous Exhibitions and Estate Management, circa 1985-2010


Subseries 4.2: Hatch-Billops Collection Projects, 1974-1990


Subseries 4.3: Writing and Biography Research, 1982-2010

Series 5: Books and Exhibition Catalogues, 1970-2006

Series 6: Jewelry Artifacts, circa 1979-1980, undated

Series 7: Music Collection, circa 1946-1949, undated
processinfo: label: Processing Information
content: This collection and finding aid were produced in association with History Associated, Inc. (HAI) represented by archivist Laura Bell. NMAAHC representatives include archivist Ja-Zette Marshburn, curator Dr. Joanne Hyppolite, curatorial intern Nina Elaine Pulley, museum specialist Julia Hirsch and processing archivist Earnest Lucious.
scopecontent: label: Scope and Contents
content: The Art Smith Archive (1909-2010, bulk dates 1930-1982) documents the life, art and career, and posthumous legacy of Arthur (Art) George Smith (1917-1982), a twentieth century Black, gay, modernist studio jewelry artist. The collection documents Arthur Smith's personal and family life, his professional activities as a jewelry artist based in New York City, and his posthumous legacy. The collection contains family and personal papers and photographs documenting the Smith family's experience emigrating to New York City from Cuba in the early 1900s and their lives in Brooklyn. The collection mainly documents Arthur's work as a jeweler through his drawings and sketches, business papers, clippings and advertisements, numerous photographs and photo boards displaying jewelry for promotion and advertisement, and his exhibitions work. Additionally, Arthur's personal connections and interests in art, jazz, and dance in mid-century New York are represented in the collection through items such as his Wax Records jazz collection and Katherine Dunham Dancers broadside advertisement collected and maintained by Charles Russell, Arthur's partner. The collection also displays the ongoing legacy and study of Arthur Smith's craftsmanship and modernist jewelry style through documentation of a number of posthumous exhibitions and memorializing projects. The collection is comprised of family and biographical personal papers, photographs, business records, correspondence, clippings and periodicals, artwork, jewelry artifacts and prototypes, and collected music recordings. The collection also includes oversized photographs, drawings, and designs, and other items.