Zak Smith (B. 1976)

In Zak Smith’s graphically inky portrait Girls in the Naked Girl Business: Sasha Grey, 2007, the titular Sasha Grey sits delicately enfolded in a chair. Swathes of matte black flatten the details of the drawing, while punchy yellows, blues and pinks pop within the monochrome room. Grey works as an adult film star, and in Smith’s portrait is vulnerable and sensitive. Girls in the Naked Girl Business: Sasha Grey is part of a larger cycle of works that compassionately attempts to reframe the pornography industry. As the artist said, ‘Anyone can know that any other human being is a human being and that someone who isn’t like you is still a human being, at least intellectually. I think what a lot of artists try to do is to show one kind of person to other kinds of people so that they say, ‘Look, this is a whole person!’… Part of it is that I imagine myself a few years ago. What questions did I have? What did I not know? What did I wish I understood?’ Smith’s work has been exhibited at the Minneapolis Institute of Art, and he was included in the 2004 Whitney Biennial.