#NCTRIAD | Craig Smith
#NCTRIAD, Craig Smith (Gainesville, FL).
May 2017. Golf clubs, video, trophy plate, curated film screening series.
Smith considers sport both a durational event and convivial encounter. Examining dimensions of time and interaction within sport, over the course of his residency he visited and played at eight golf courses within the Piedmont Triad region—photographing, meeting, and dining with community golfers at each club. Discussing both art and activity with local athletes, Smith investigated the ways in which memory and social ties are shaped by organized sport.
Exploring “sport” through a broader lens, Smith curated and hosted a series of “Love Triangles” film screenings in the Elsewhere Collaboratory. Choosing early 1960s films by director Michelangelo Antonioni, Smith studied cinematic strategies of location, narrative, and fashion as a means to illustrate complicated social entanglements, psychological struggles, and triadic community relations. Though not incorporated into Smith's final work, these screenings served as experimental steps towards his final installation, exemplifying how durational, social events can engage an audience through a shared goal.
Culminating his time at Elsewhere, Smith assembled golf clubs, celebratory sport artifacts, and a personalized plaque to synthesize his thematic explorations into a playfully contemplative installation.
