Grapefruit, from Human_3.0 Reading List, Cauleen Smith, 2016
Cauleen SmithAmerican

Grapefruit, from Human_3.0 Reading List

2016 · Drawing and Watercolor

Can I see it?

Not on view at present

Where is “Grapefruit, from Human_3.0 Reading List” now? Collection: Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago. Not on view at present. Checked September 29, 2026.

Art Institute of Chicago

Chicago, United States

It belongs to the collection, but is not on display at present.

Checked
In this state since
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The museum

About the work

Over the course of eighteen months in 2015 and 2016, Chicago-based artist Cauleen Smith produced a series of 57 drawings, each representing a specific book that she has read. Together, these drawings propose a reading list, a new canon of humanistic literacy so urgently needed here and now.

The personal impact of reading is conveyed through Smith’s choice of media; the time and effort to create drawings by hand reflects the special power of holding and reading a physical book. As her primary discipline is film, the decision to make a series of drawings is especially significant. In these objects Smith reveals intellectual touchstones essential to her worldview, but she also provokes us to consider which of these books is critical to our collective experience: Have you read these books? What do they mean to us now? What would you add to this list?

Art Institute of ChicagoCC BY 4.0

Details

Accession number
Obj: 238042

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