Kiki Smith’s work often explores our relationship to myth and nature. MoMA suggests,
In her recent work Smith has often turned to fairy tales in search of dramatic female personae and alter egos. The poignant vulnerability of childhood is an underlying theme in many of her images, like this one, based on Lewis Carroll’s manuscript drawings for Alice’s Adventures Under Ground (1886). The tension between young girls and animals pervades this scene as Alice struggles in a pool of her own tears with the duck, the dodo, and others.
Smith observes, “Making art is a lot about just seeing what happens if you put some energy into something.”
In Pool of Tears 2, a cluster of animals is grouped behind Alice with the horizon between foregrounded blue water and greyish sky that meet in the middle in an expanse of sea. continue reading
