Eliel (curator of modern art, Los Angeles County Museum of Art) presents this survey of mid-century American sculptor David Smith's work as a companion piece to LACMA's 2010 retrospective exhibition. She features 150 illustrations, including paintings, sketches, and photographs, as well as both contemporary and period photography of his sculptures. Four accompanying essays reflect on Smith's artistic process and relationship with other artists of his time such as Kandinsky, De Kooning and Pollock; his identity as part of the working class and the infusion of that self-image into his medium and work in general; the primacy of geometry and simplicity in his work, which was then influenced by abstraction, texture and movement; and the extension of his principles and aesthetic to other media such as paint and photography. Annotation ©2011 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)