  
  About the Artwork
  
  
  Tony Smith came to sculpture from architecture and design. In about 1960 he turned his professional attention to organically derived, and then to crystalline and modular, three-dimensional forms. A friend of the Abstract Expressionists, and a teacher who impressed students by correlating the experience of art and sculpture with that of life and the environment, Smith saw his career take off late, almost contemporaneously with that of minimalists Donald Judd and Carl Andre.

Inspiration for &acirc;&#128;&#156;Gracehoper&acirc;&#128;&#157; goes back to 1963, a reflection on the tetrahedrons and octahedrons Smith had encountered in crystallography. One of his most complex sculptures, it took eight years for him to realize it on the intended scale. The six separately fabricated steel units were assembled on the museum&acirc;&#128;&#153;s north lawn in 1972. The title, a pun on the grasshopper it resembles, derives from the mythical beast of the same name in James Joyce&acirc;&#128;&#153;s &acirc;&#128;&#156;Finnegan&acirc;&#128;&#153;s Wake.&acirc;&#128;&#157;
  
  
  Title
  Gracehoper
  
  
  Artwork Date
  1961
  
  Artist
  Tony Smith
  
  
  
  Life Dates
  1912 - 1980
  
  
  
  
  Nationality
  
  
  
  Please note:
  Definitions for nationality may vary significantly, depending on chronology and world events.
  Some definitions include:
  Belonging to a people having a common origin based on a geography and/or descent and/or tradition and/or culture and/or religion and/or language, or sharing membership in a legally defined nation.
  
  
  
  American
  
  
  
  Culture
  
  
  
  Please note:
  Cultures may be defined by the language, customs, religious beliefs, social norms, and material traits of a group.
  
  
  
  
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  Medium
  Steel and paint
  
  
  Dimensions
  Overall: 23 &Atilde;&#151; 22 &Atilde;&#151; 46 feet (7 m 1 cm &Atilde;&#151; 6 m 70.6 cm &Atilde;&#151; 14 m 2.1 cm)
  
  
  Classification
  Sculpture
  
  
  Department
  Contemporary Art after 1950
  
  
  Credit
  Founders Society Purchase with funds from W. Hawkins Ferry and Mr. and Mrs. Walter Buhl Ford II Fund, Eleanor Clay Ford Fund, Marie and Alex Manoogian Fund and members of the Friends of Modern Art
  
  
  
  Accession Number
  
  
  
  This unique number is assigned to an individual artwork as part of the cataloguing process at the time of entry into the permanent collection.
  Most frequently, accession numbers begin with the year in which the artwork entered the museum&acirc;&#128;&#153;s holdings.
  For example, 2008.3 refers to the year of acquisition and notes that it was the 3rd of that year. The DIA has a few additional systems&acirc;&#128;&#148;no longer assigned&acirc;&#128;&#148;that identify specific donors or museum patronage groups.
  
  
  
  72.436
  
  
  Copyright
  Non-commercial all standard museum
  
  
  
