Old School Beats 1/3

About Old School Beats 1/3

Remember the boom box? Roch Smith does. The precursor to the current generation of music devices like the ‘beats’ headphones, this boom box is huge and sits on the shoulders of a casually dressed male figure, cast in bronze, arms raised holding the box behind his head. The Toronto artist often uses toy-like figures to make cultural statements that are both fun and thoughtful. One in a series of three.

“When I was at art school in Vancouver, I started to use my GI Joe in photographs and sculptures and he became a way to speak about play, masculinity and memory.” Roch Smith

He received a BFA (Honours Sculpture) from the Emily Carr Institute of Art and Design (ECIAD - 1997) and an MFA from York University (2003). A teacher as well as an artist, he has taught classes at the University of Waterloo, ECIAD and York University. He currently manages and operates the bronze and aluminum foundry at York University. Roch Smith has exhibited throughout Canada and in the US. His work is included in private, corporate and museum collections.