Leslie Smith III: Leave Your Baggage at the Door: Museum of Wisconsin Art

Leave Your Baggage at the Door presents approximately 22 paintings by Leslie Smith III, ranging in scale from the intimate to the monumental. Created between 2010 and 2024, the works span more than a decade of Smith’s studio practice and reveal important moments and connections within his approach to abstraction.

Seen together for the first time, the paintings trace Smith’s progression from abstract paintings on traditional flat canvas supports to shaped works that culminate in complex, mixed-media constructions that fracture and expand the picture plane. Throughout this evolution, Smith has pushed the illusionistic and optical possibilities of painting while testing its physical boundaries.

This focused retrospective follows the artist’s ongoing effort to communicate personal stories through abstraction while eliciting universal emotional responses. His paintings offer a sensory and conceptual experience, pairing striking compositions with evocative titles that invite reflection and interpretation.

Smith grew up in metropolitan Washington, DC, and now lives in Madison, Wisconsin. He earned his BFA degree from the Maryland Institute College of Art in Baltimore and his MFA from Yale University. He is an associate professor of drawing and painting at the University of Wisconsin–Madison.

Smith invites you to leave your baggage at the door and take time to look. Seeing can offer a quiet portal to emotion, empathy, and reflection.