The Cleveland Museum of Art

Collection Online as of December 18, 2025

Pilgrim

1957

David Smith

(American, 1906–1965)
America
steel
Overall: 206.9 cm (81 7/16 in.)
Contemporary Collection of The Cleveland Museum of Art 1966.385
© The Estate of David Smith / Licensed by VAGA at Artists Rights Society (ARS), NY
Location: 227 Abstract Expressionism

Did You Know?

The teenaged David Smith took a correspondence course in cartooning with the Cleveland School (now Institute) of Art.

Description

A former automobile assembly line worker, Smith welded locomotives and tanks for a manufacturer during World War II. Perhaps not surprisingly, he adopted industrial materials and techniques throughout his career as a sculptor. Regarding his preferred medium, Smith stated, "The material called iron or steel I hold in high respect . . .The metal itself possesses little art history. What associations it possesses are those of this century: power, structure, movement, progress, suspension, destruction, brutality."
  • Henning, Edward B. “Two New Contemporary Sculptures.” The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 54, no. 7 (September 1967): 219–227. Mentioned and reproduced: p. 223-225, fig. 5 www.jstor.org
    The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1969. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1969. Reproduced: p. 201 archive.org
    Cleveland Museum of Art. Art of the Twentieth Century in the Cleveland Museum of Art. Cleveland, OH: Dept. of Art History & Education, CMA, 1969. Mentioned and Reproduced: p. 4 archive.org
    Cleveland Museum of Art, Gabriel P. Weisberg, H. W. Janson, and Case Western Reserve University. Traditions and Revisions: Themes from the History of Sculpture. Cleveland, Kent, Ohio: Cleveland Museum of Art ; Distributed by the Kent State University Press, 1975. Reproduced: p. 139; Mentioned: p. 144, no. 118
    The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1978. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1978. Reproduced: p. 253 archive.org
    Henning, Edward B. Creativity in Art and Science, 1860-1960. [Cleveland, Ohio]: Published by the Cleveland Museum of Art in cooperation with Indiana University Press, 1987. Mentioned and reproduced: P. 135, no. 46
    Smith, Candida N., David Smith, Irving Sandler, Mark Di Suvero, Jerry L. Thompson, and Storm King Art Center. The Fields of David Smith. Mountainville, N.Y., New York, N.Y.: Storm King Art Center; Thames & Hudson, 1999. Mentioned: p. 143
    Brenson, Michael. David Smith: The Art and Life of a Transformational Sculptor. First edition. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2022. Mentioned, p. 496
  • The Fields of David Smith (Part II). Storm King Art Center, Mountainville, NY (May 1-November 1, 1998).
    Creativity in Art and Science, 1860-1960. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (September 16-November 8, 1987).
    Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, CA: Individuals: A Selected History of Contemporary Art, 1945-1986, December 6, 1986-June 10, 1987.
    Traditions and Revisions: Themes from the History of Sculpture. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (September 24-November 16, 1975).
    Year in Review: 1967. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (November 29-December 31, 1967).
    Fogg Art Museum, Harvard University, 1966: "David Smith, 1906-1965: A Retrospective Exhibition," cat. #332, also to Washington Gallery of Modern Art, 1967
    Sao Paulo Biennial, 1959
    Allen Memorial Art Museum, Oberlin, 1958: "Sculpture 1950-1958," Allen Memorial Art Museum Bulletin, XV (Winter 1958), p. 83, illus.
    Museum of Modern Art, NY, 1957: "David Smith"
  • {{cite web|title=Pilgrim|url=false|author=David Smith|year=1957|access-date=18 December 2025|publisher=Cleveland Museum of Art}}

Source URL:

https://www.clevelandart.org/art/1966.385