About This Work

Note : Will be removed from stretchers and shipped in a tube. Inspired by the movie "Cornbread, Earl, and Me" Residencies • Studios Inc, Studio Residency, 2022-2025 • MacDowell Fellowship Residency, 2022 • Art Omi, 2023 Awards • Charlotte Street Visual Artist Award, 2022 • Pollock-Krasner Foundation Grant, 2022 • James Baldwin Fellowship, MacDowell, 2023 Other Media • Bel-Air (Television), NBC/Peacock, Seasons 1 and 2, 2022-2023 • Queen Sugar (Television), Own Network, 1 episode, 2022 Selected Exhibitions • 2024 Dr. Blackenstein’s Black Shack of Arts and Sciences, Studios Inc, Kansas City • 2024 Benediction From the Rubble, Zhou Brothers Arts Center, Kansas City • 2024 Studios Inc Group Exhibition, Studios Inc, Kansas City • 2023 Blacktacular, Habitat Gallery, Kansas City • 2023 Let Me Tell You, Lawrence Arts Center • 2023 Summer Invitational, Sherry Leedy Contemporary Art, Kansas City • 2023 21c Hotel Museum, Kansas City • 2022 Charlotte Street Visual Artist Awards, H & R Block Artspace • 2022 Insight, University of Nebraska-Omaha • 2021 Who We Are (Group), Charlotte Street • 2021 Testament (Group), Nelson Atkins Museum of Art • 2021 All Things Being Equal: Selections from the Nerman Collection, KCAI GALLERY: Center for Contemporary Practice • 2021 The Reparations Exhibit, Natasha Ria Art Gallery • 2020 Untitled (Collect Level), Leedy-Voulkos Art Center, Kansas City (Group) • 2020 Untitled, Charlotte Street Foundation Gallery, Kansas City (Group) • 2020 True Colors, Carter Art Center, Kansas City (Group) • 2020 El-Scari Harvey Art Gallery, Center for Spiritual Living, Kansas City (Individual) • 2020 The Black Gaze, Stockdale Gallery, William Jewell College • 2019 Can You See Me?, Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art, Kansas City • 2019 Purpose, Leedy-Voulkos Art Center, Kansas City (Individual) • 2018, Cultural Legacy: What's Going On, Leedy-Voulkos Art Center, Kansas City (Group) • 2018 Louisiana Tricentennial Exhibition, Stella Jones Gallery, New Orleans (Group) • 2017/18 Black Space/Black Art, Traveling Exhibit, Kansas City (Group) • 2017 Reflections of Monk III, Wilmer Jennings Gallery at Kenkeleba, New York, (Group) • 2016 Bear Witness, Johnson County Public Library, Shawnee Mission, (Group) • 2016 Reflecting The Times, Box Gallery, Kansas City (Group) • 2016 INSPIRED: 20 Years of African American Art , Stella Jones Gallery, New Orleans, (Group) • 2015 Vernissage de Portraits de Harold Smith , Le Moulin du logis, Angouleme,France • 2014 Colors of Life, Cognac Blues Passions, Cognac, France • 2013 Convergence: Jazz and the Visual Arts, University of Maryland, David Driskell Center (Traveling Group Exhibition) • 2012 Reflections of Monk, Wilmer Jennings Gallery at Kenkeleba, New York, (Group) • 2011 Colors of Jazz, American Jazz Museum, Kansas City • 2009 Untitled, Faso Gallery, Kansas City, (Group) • 2008 Future Primitive Jazz, Montanaro Gallery, Rhode Island, Group • 2007 Plantation Lullabies, Nobis Gallery, Newark (Group) • 2006 Tribal Masks And Jazzstracts, Montanaro Gallery, Rhode • 2001 Kansas City, KS Public Library Films: • Natasha Portrait of an Urban Poet, 2011, screened at Westport Coffeehouse, Maysles Cinema (NYC) • Bouncer, 2013, screened at Westport Coffeehouse. • The Gospel According to Glenn North, 2017, screened at the Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art, Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Penn Valley Community College • A Time To Sew: The Art of Sonie Ruffin, (in production) Selected Non-Fiction Writings: • “Harold Smith: BLACKTACULAR” and “César Velez: Movement Through Memory,” Habitat Contemporary Gallery, November 2023, KC Studio • Harold Smith on the Art of Blackness | The Art of Black Preaching: Comforting the Afflicted and Afflicting the Comfortable, July 2023, KC Studio • Harold Smith on the Art of Blackness: More than Sustenance, Soul Food Speaks to the Power of the Human Spirit, June 2023, KC Studio • “Distinctly Human, portraits by Kwanza Humphrey,” The Gallery at HJ’s Community Center, June 2023, KC Studio • Abstractions That ‘Absorb One’s Anguishing’, May 2023, KC Studio • At KCI, Jazz Meets Visual Art in Willie Cole’s ‘Ornithology, Jan 2023, KC Studio • Honors: Amber “Flutienastiness” Underwood, Nov 2022, KC Studio • Telling the Story of African American Music, September 2022, KC Studio • The American Jazz Museum at 25: ‘The Realization of a Dream’, September 2022, KC Studio • The Art of Courage, August 2022, KC Studio • ‘Black Citizenship in the Age of Jim Crow’: National WWI Museum and Memorial, June 2022, KC Studio • Shinique Smith: STARGAZERS, Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art • Jade Powers Named Curator of Contemporary Art at the Harn Museum of Art at the University of Florida, May 2022, KC Studio • ‘This Is Not Easy Viewing’, May 2022, KC Studio • Vivian Wilson Bluett: Expressions of Blue, Natasha Ria Art Gallery, March 2022, KC Studio • The Soul of Jazz: An American Adventure, American Jazz Museum, February 2022, KC Studio • Diallo Javonne French: Honest Musical Moments, January 2022, KC Studio • Honors: Rodney Thompson, November 2021, KC Studio • Dr. Adrianna Marshall: A Passionate Advocate for Arts Education in Public Schools, September 2021, KC Studio • Honors: Tyree Johnson, September 2021, KC Studio • Testimony: The Misrepresentation of Black Men and Boys, A Conversation Series, August 2021, KC Studio • Gallery of the Moment: A Sistine Chapel of Black Joy, May 2021, KC Studio • Kansas City Black Artists Directory, May 2021, KC Studio • What Black Artists Want: A Manifesto, June 2021, KC Studio • Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art Acquires Kobe Urn by KCAI Alum Roberto Lugo, March 2021, KC Studio • Artist to Watch: Clarissa Knighten, March 2021, KC Studio • Honors: Vivian Wilson Bluett, January 2021, KC Studio • Arts News: Jazz Age Lives on at Lonnie’s Reno Club, January 2021, KC Studio • London Williams & Izsys Archer: In Truth, Black Angels, Haw Contemporary, January 2021, KC Studio • Sheila Pree Bright: #1960Now, , November 2020, KC Studio • Kemper Museum Presents Dawoud Bey Photographs from the Bill and Christy Gautreaux Collection, November 2020, KC Studio • Real Black: A spectrum of the Black present, UMKC Gallery of Art, October 2020, KC Studio • Kwanza Humphrey: The Human Experience, Bunker Center for the Arts, September 2020, KC Studio • The Challenges of Black Gallery Ownership in Kansas City, July 2020, KC Studio • Honors: Emiel Cleaver, May 2020, KC Studio • Building a More Open, Inclusive and Diverse Arts Scene, May 2020, KC Studio • Artist Pages: 25 Kemper Watchers Pick 25 Favorites, September 2019, KC Studio, (Contributing Writer) • Artist Pages: The Art of Black Hair Braiding, July 2019, KC Studio • Glyneisha Johnson: Bo? oz?m, Haw Contemporary Crossroads, June 2019, • Honors: Sheri Purpose Hall, May 2019, KC Studio • Bold and Confrontational Display Reflects the Collective Consciousness of the Black Experience, April 2019, KC Studios • An Interview with Jade Powers, November 2018, KC Studio • Championing Kansas City’s Black Arts Scene, April 2018, KC Studio • Artist Pages: Black Art in Kansas City, April 2018, KC Studio • An Ode to True Black Manhood, March 2018, KC Studio Selected Fictional Writings: • Descent (republish with artwork included), 2024, self-published • Derrick, short, 2023, self-published • The Young Woman and the Old Painter, short, 2014, self-published • Coffeehouse Theology, 2008, poetry, self-published • Descent 2004, novel, self-published • The Confessions of a Downlow Brother, 2003, ghostwriter “Rayman Jackson” • It Began To Rain, short story, 1980, published in high school anthology Selected Press: • Kansas City Artist Harold Smith is Racking Up the Recognition, Including a Prestigious Pollock-Krasner Foundation Grant, Elisabeth Kirsch, , November 2022 • “So Fresh,” Bruce R. Watkins Cultural Heritage Center, KCUR, June 2022 • Kansas City artist Harold Smith is everywhere these days — including on the TV show ‘Bel-Air’, KCUR, March 2022 • Art As Reparations: This Painter Is Cutting His Prices For People Who Live East Of Troost In Kansas City, KCUR, May 2021 • Harold D. Smith, Jr.: Can You See Me?, Elisabeth Kirsch, , September 2019 • This Kansas City Artist Paints To Make Black Men More Visible, KCUR, August 2019 • Harold Smith: Art As a Platform for Activism, Alice Thorson, KC Studio (online), May 2017 • Last Glance: Harold Smith, May 2015, KC Studio • Le blues aux couleurs de la vie, Francoise Digel, Angouleme Sudquest, June 2014 • Harold Smith la sacra fiamma del jazz, JazzColors Magazine, 2013 • Music, Life, History Meld in Art, Alice Thorson, Kansas City Star, April 2011 • Jazzin’ Up Art, Marilyn Bellemore, Newport This Week, April 2006 • Interview with Harold Smith, VERGE (online), Meana Kasi, July 2001 • Intimate Images Explore Racism, Injustice, Kansas City Star, Caprice Stapley, June 2001 • Books: • McGarvey, E. & Weiss, J. (2013). 2pac v. Biggie : an illustrated history of rap's greatest battle. Minneapolis, MN: Voyageur Press. • Koppelman, S. & Franks, A. (2008). Collecting and the Internet : essays on the pursuit of old passions through new technologies. Jefferson, N.C: McFarland & Co. Residencies • Studios Inc, Studio Residency, 2022-2025 • MacDowell Fellowship Residency, 2022 • Art Omi, 2023 Awards • Charlotte Street Visual Artist Award, 2022 • Pollock-Krasner Foundation Grant, 2022 • James Baldwin Fellowship, MacDowell, 2023 • Kansas City Artist Coalition Honorary Artist, 2023 Other Media • Bel-Air (Television), NBC/Peacock, Seasons 1 and 2, 2022-2023 • Queen Sugar (Television), Own Network, 1 episode, 2022