Emily Mae Smith

Emily Mae Smith's surreal oil paintings are ripe with erotic tension, subconscious emotion and anxiety. Drawing influence from Art Nouveau illustration and Pop Art, her works conflate imagery associated with desire and beauty with the comic, satirical modes of cartooning. Her subjects possess human features but are depictive of psyche rather than physical form. A common theme in Smith's work is the incorporation of the broom character derived from Disney's animation The Sorcerer's Apprentice, which she presents as an erotic female nude in repose; a nod to the history of the odalisque in art. 

Smith's work has appeared in solo exhibitions at Simone Subal Gallery in New York, NY (2017); SALTS. Gallery in Birsfelden, Switzerland (2017); Rodolphe Janssen Gallery in Brussels, Belgium (2016); Mary Mary Gallery in Glasgow, UK (2016); Laurel Gitlen Gallery in New York, NY (2015); and Junior Projects in New York, NY (2014). She has also participated in group exhibitions internationally, at galleries including Rob Tufnell inCologne, Germany; Left Field Gallery in San Luis Obispo, CA; Adams and Ollman in Portland, OR; Present Company in Brooklyn NY; Le Coeur in Paris, France; König Galerie in Berlin, Germany; Soho Revue in London, UK; DREI Galerie in Cologne, Germany, and more. Her work has been featured in The New York Times, Artforum, Art in America, Purple Magazine, The New Yorker, ARTnews, W Magazine, and Kaleidoscope Magazine. She lives and works in Brooklyn, New York.