"Big Diamond"

            David Smith’s piece, “Big Diamond,” is peculiar, but wildly interesting. From a distance, it looks as though it is some sort of carnival game, full of hoops to throw a ball or some sort of object through. It is composed of a variety of different colors and shapes. The colors range anywhere from yellow to grey, with a bit of salmon, orange, and red mixed in between. This structure has an array of shapes including circular rings and hoops, rectangles, diamonds, and triangles. Within the largest diamond, contains a single capital “T.” The backside of the object, with the exception of the “T,” is a lot less detailed. More than likely, that was the artist’s attempt to keep attention focused on the front of the piece. At certain angles, it almost looks like some sort of creature or animal. The large diamond is its body, and the rest of the shapes compromise the rest of its body. The head shape, which is also a diamond, is wearing what looks like an earring.

            This piece was strange to look at from all angles, particularly because it looked like an entirely different piece of art depending on your viewpoint. The colors were strange and almost contrasted with each other, giving the piece a very dynamic, geometrical look. Out of all of David Smith’s work that we saw, “Big Diamond” seemed to be the only piece with triangular and diamond shapes. The majority of his pieces were full of large plates of steel and rectangular shapes. This piece really stood out from the rest of them. It was crooked, bizarre, and really caught our attention. We seemed to change our interpretation of what the piece was each time we examined it. Curiously, David Smith worked as a welder at an American locomotive company. That seemed to inspire his work greatly, especially after seeing all of the twisted steel and contorted metals.

Matthew Foreman
Mike McGee