Sidewall, Maiden & Moonflower

Maiden & Moonflower is wallpaper designed by the artist Kiki Smith. The paper was originally created for an exhibition of Smith’s work at the Museum Haus Esters in Germany in 2008, and has since gone into commercial production. The scene depicts a star-filled sky surrounding a woman standing beneath a tree bough. It addresses the spiritual and eternal aspects of human nature and speaks to our connection to nature during our solitary journey.
Kiki Smith was born in Germany but has been active in New York for many years. Her body of work incorporates many different media, including sculpture, printmaking, photography, and drawing. Although she is better known for her sculpture, printmaking has been of equal importance in Smith’s work. Much of her work focuses on the inner and outer workings of the human body, including fertility and other bodily functions, which are portrayed in some of her earliest pieces. Smith later began looking outside the human body, exploring humankind’s relationship to the environment; stars and stellar bodies became more prominent in her work. Feminine associations have been a long-running theme in her work and she frequently incorporates photographic images of herself in the creation of prints or collages.
She began experimenting with screenprinting in the 1980s, drawn to its spontaneous nature and ease of use. Calling on her extensive experience as a screenprinter, Smith not only designed this pattern but transferred the design onto the acetate necessary for making the screen, making the entire print a product of her own hand.
Smith’s work has been exhibited in prominent museums and galleries in the United States, including the Corcoran Gallery of Art, the Museum of Modern Art, the Whitney Museum of American Art, and the Brooklyn Museum. Her work is also owned by many prestigious collections, including the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles.
This roll of Maiden & Moonflower is being offered as a gift by the paper’s manufacturer, Studio Printworks. The addition of this piece would strengthen the museum’s collection of artist-designed papers, which at the time of proposed acquisition includes pieces by Charles Burchfield, Andy Warhol, Allen Jones, Joan Nelson, William Wegman, and Trenton Doyle Hancock. The piece would also enhance the museum’s holdings of American wallpapers.

Sidewall, Maiden & Moonflower; Designed by Kiki Smith (American, b. Germany, 1954); Made by Studio Printworks (United States); USA; screen printed on paper; Repeat H x W: 193 × 61 cm (6 ft. 4 in. × 24 in.); Gift of Studio Printworks; 2013-2-1