Tony Smith was one of the twenty-three artists chosen to participate in the inaugural—and now widely influential—edition of LACMA’s Art and Technology (A&T) program (1967–1971), which paired individual artists with industrial corporations for the creation of new works. Smith’s participation resulted in two large-scale, immersive installations, both titled Bat Cave, made out of corrugated cardboard (courtesy of the Chicago-based Container Corporation of America) for the Osaka World Expo ‘70 and the LACMA Art and Technology showcase in 1971.
Composed entirely of identical tetrahedrons (four-sided forms with triangular faces), Yellowbird is a painted scale model of one of the 2500 modular units that comprise Bat Cave and was made into a multiple with an edition of 275 to fundraise for LACMA’s Contemporary Art Council (now Modern and Contemporary Art Council). The work captures the radical shift in Smith’s approach to form at the end of 1960s, during which he increasingly resorted to modular, repeated forms. Having expressed interest in making a “soft sculpture” for his A&T commission, by which he meant relatively ephemeral and weightless, Smith also favored corrugated cardboard for its slightly rippling surface. Even though the artist believed that color could provide “clarity” to forms, his works are usually black. Yellowbird is therefore a rare example of Smith’s use of color.