CARRIE SMITH LIBMAN

From the first small kick of my ribs, I have been hyper aware of my role as a mother. Be the environment, the soil, the sun, and the rain. Hold lightly your hopes and dreams for your children. Cultivate, like a gardener, the environment for them to chase and realize their own.

Since becoming a mother my practice has become a direct and indirect collaboration with my children. I document their growth alongside my own rebirth, each piece a balance of chaos and control. I work in short, colorful bursts of time, an imperfect patchwork of moments and memories and future concepts. Collage and assemblage lend themselves to this style of working and the current stage of motherhood I’m in. I make work from the domestic artifacts of our life: outgrown toys, threadbare onesies, and daily clutter. Out of the collaged masses sprout seedlings and wildflowers, new and undefined, confident, eager, and fragile all the same. The fledgling, unfinished leaves and buds are as much myself as they are my children, as they are any of us, stretching toward the sun, delicate and full of potential. The work becomes an artifact of these first few years of parenting, a combination of very physical care, constant doubt if you are doing it right, and children that continue to grow.

Carrie Smith Libman is an artist living and working in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania with her partner and three young children. She received her BFA in Sculpture from Washington University in St. Louis and her MFA in Sculpture from the University of Florida where she also taught Sculpture and Drawing. She is an active member of Pittsburgh’s art community through Associated Artists of Pittsburgh, Society of Sculptors, and Flock Artist Collective, a group of local Artist/Mothers dedicated to showing work in the region. As a compliment to her studio practice, Carrie works in healthcare strategy. She finds endless inspiration in the intersections and overlaps of her creative practice, corporate America, and motherhood.