Mike Smith
Mike Smith (b. 1951) is a documentary photographer and Professor Emeritus of Photography at East Tennessee State University where he began teaching in 1981. Since then, his work is largely centered on the culture and landscape of his home of Johnson City and the surrounding areas of rural Appalachia, drawing contrasts between the modern and rural, past and present, traditions and change. Smith’s images have appeared in renowned outlets such as Harper’s, The Washington Post, The New York Times Magazine, and Oxford American. He has been honored with a Guggenheim Fellowship, the United States Artist Lowe Fellowship, and the Tennessee Governor’s Arts Award. Collections holding Smith’s photographs include the Whitney Museum of American Art (New York); The Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York); The Museum of Modern Art (New York); the Art Institute of Chicago; the Cleveland Museum of Art (Cleveland, OH); the Los Angeles County Museum of Art; the Museum of Fine Arts (Boston); the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts (Richmond); the Library of Congress (Washington, DC), and more.