"According to my mother, Jean Freas , 'Australia' was the first to be placed squarely in the center of the field beyond the house. David Smith was well aware that 'Australia', with its fluid gestures of a long arm swinging gracefully, was an extremely important piece, heralding a new era for his work. It represented a culmination of his sinuous use of metal and the technique of drawing in space. Thus planted, Australia drew not just in any space--such as the impartial space of a museum gallery -- but in the specific landscape of Bolton Landing."

“I maintain my identity by regular work, there is always labor when inspiration has fled, but inspiration returns quicker when identity and the work stream are maintained.”

“Possibly steel is so beautiful because of all the movement associated with it, its strength and functions.. .Yet it is also brutal: the rapist, the murderer and death-dealing giants are also its offspring.”

“Our open fields on the mountaintop are fully exposed to the sky, clouds, and wind without mediation… The fields are quiet to the world but amplify the force of one's thoughts and feelings.. .My father put his sculptures in our fields so that he could look at each work in relation to the natural world of the mountains and sky and also to its fellow sculptures. Again and again, he referred to his 'work stream'; each work of art being as a vessel filled from the stream while never wholly separate.”

“Possibly I can explain my own procedure more easily. When I begin a sculpture I'm not always sure how it is going to end. In a way it has a relationship to the work before, it is in continuity with the previous work — it often holds a promise or a gesture toward the one to follow.”

“My father acted at all times and in all aspects of his life from his identity as an artist. He had no other. He cooked with the extravagant generosity and adventurousness of an artist. He parented as an artist -- his children should not wear 'pretty' colors, but rather 'gutsy' colors.. .While he could be generous, spontaneous, playful and hospitable, the sense of 'I am' was all about 'I am an artist.' There was little room to identify himself in terms of other people. And so he felt lonesome.”

“I will not change an error if it feels right, for the error is more human than perfection. I do not seek answers. I haven't named this work nor thought where it would go. I haven't thought what it is for, except that it is made to be seen. I've made it because it comes closer to saying who I am than any other method I can use. This work is my identity.”