Carolein Smit creates exquisite ceramic sculptures that convey a visual language that alludes to a contemporary reading of vanitas; life and death as made visible in her collection of natural, scientific, religious, and anatomical forms. The sculptures classify the weird and rare, in order to maintain the scientific order, but at the same time, they elevate the supernatural to contain the vagaries of nature resulting in a beautiful ambivalence. Considering that we live in a world with many beautiful but also very difficult sides, her images are about that emotional short circuit which evokes the tension between guilt and innocence, power and impotence, life and death. Carolein has mastered the material and technology of ceramics and continually strives to maximize beauty and craftsmanship of her works. 

Carolein has exhibited in the Victoria and Albert Museum, Kunsthal Rotterdam, Stedelijk Museum Breda, Bonnefantenmuseum Maastricht and her work can be found in the collections of the Grassimuseum, Leipzig, Germany; Asante Collection, Basel, Switzerland; Collection J. Schwartz, New York, USA; Victoria and Albert Museum, London, GB; Museum Beelden aan Zee, NL; among others.

Represented by Galerie Fontana