Pilgrim

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      Cauleen Smith, Pilgrim, 2017, digital video, color, sound; 07:41 minutes, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Museum purchase made possible by the SJ Weiler Fund, 2020.54.2, © 2020, Cauleen Smith

      Artwork Details

      Title
      Pilgrim
      Date
      2017
      Location
      Not on view
      Copyright
      © 2020, Cauleen Smith
      Credit Line
      Museum purchase made possible by the SJ Weiler Fund
      Mediums
      Mediums Description
      digital video, color, sound; 07:41 minutes
      Classifications
      Subjects
      • Architecture Exterior
      • Landscape
      Object Number
      2020.54.2

      Artwork Description

      Smith's art and filmmaking has always been driven by histories of Black brilliance that resonate across time. Listening closely to the spiritual and musical philosophies of composer, performer, and swamini Alice Coltrane Turiyasangitananda (1937--2007) has inspired Smith's recent works. Smith's cinematic collages connect Coltrane's transformative visions to others who create spaces for liberation from the nineteenth century to the present.

      In Pilgrim, Coltrane's experimental jazz piano unfurls as Smith's camera moves solemnly through the white ashram buildings and hillside setting of the Hindu community Coltrane founded in California. These scenes soon merge with the gothic spirals of Watts Towers, mid-twentieth-century folk sculptures in southern Los Angeles, before fading into a Shaker cemetery in upstate New York, where a pre--Civil War religious group lived the values of racial and gender equality.

      Musical Thinking: New Video Art and Sonic Strategies, 2023

      Works by this artist (626 items)

      Werner Drewes, Central Density, 1973, oil on canvas, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Museum purchase, 1975.116
      Central Density
      Date1973
      oil on canvas
      On view
      Werner Drewes, Pointed Brown and Floating Circles, 1933, oil, pen and ink, and pencil on wood panel, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of Patricia and Phillip Frost, 1986.92.17
      Pointed Brown and Floating Circles
      Date1933
      oil, pen and ink, and pencil on wood panel
      On view
      Werner Drewes, Suspended Forms, woodcut, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of the artist, 1977.21.11
      Suspended Forms
      woodcut
      Not on view
      Werner Drewes, Summer Bouquet (no. 242), color woodcut, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of the artist, 1968.9.81
      Summer Bouquet (no. 242)
      color woodcut
      Not on view

      Related Books

      The cover of the publication Musical Thinking New Video Art & Sonic Strategies
      Musical Thinking: New Video Art and Sonic Strategies 
      Exploring the powerful resonances between recent video art and popular music, the exhibition Musical Thinking: New Video Art and Sonic Strategies features ten leading contemporary artists and the work.

      Exhibitions

      Media - 2020.54.1 - SAAM-2020.54.1_2 - 139600
      Musical Thinking: New Video Art and Sonic Strategies
      June 23, 2023January 28, 2024
      Musical Thinking explores the powerful resonances between recent video art and popular music.

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      City is Man
      Date1941-1952
      linocut
      Not on view
      Claire Falkenstein, Untitled, 1976, embossed paper, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of The Falkenstein Foundation, 2019.27.18, ©1997, The Falkenstein Foundation
      Untitled
      Date1976
      embossed paper
      Not on view
      Claire Falkenstein, Mandala, 1977, lithograph, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of The Falkenstein Foundation, 2019.27.19, ©1997, The Falkenstein Foundation
      Mandala
      Date1977
      lithograph
      Not on view
      Les Quais de la Seine a Paris
      Date1917
      hand-colored etching on postcard
      Not on view