View source for Harry Everett Smith

{{short description|American polymath (1923-1991)}}
{{other uses|Harry Smith (disambiguation){{!}}Harry Smith}}
{{use mdy dates|date=September 2011}}
{{more footnotes|date=June 2024}}
{{Infobox person
| name               = Harry E. Smith
| image              = Harry Everett Smith 1965.jpg
| alt                = 
| caption            = Smith c. 1965
| birth_name         = 
| birth_date         = {{Birth date|1923|05|29}}
| birth_place        = [[Portland, Oregon]], U.S.
| death_date         = {{Death date and age|1991|11|27|1923|05|29}}
| death_place        = [[New York City]], U.S.
| other_names        = 
| occupation         = Visual artist, filmmaker, ethnographer
| known_for          = {{hlist|[[Anthology of American Folk Music|The Anthology of American Folk Music]]|[[Heaven and Earth Magic]]}}
| awards             = [[Grammy]]
| module             = <!--{{Ordination | expand = | denomination = Gnosticism | embed = yes |name = Harry Everett Smith | alternate name = | ordained deacon by 1 = | date of diaconal ordination 1 = | place of diaconal ordination 1 = | ordained priest by 1 = | date of priestly ordination 1 = | place of priestly ordination 1 =  | consecrated by 1 = [[William Breeze|William Gary Keith Breeze]] (Tau Silenus) AKA Hymenaeus Beta | co-consecrators 1 = | date of consecration 1 = 1986 | place of consecration 1 =  | sources = | qid = | suppressfields = | onlysourced = }}-->
}}

'''Harry Everett Smith''' (May 29, 1923 &ndash; November 27, 1991) was an American [[polymath]], who was credited variously as an [[fine art|artist]], experimental [[filmmaking|filmmaker]], [[Bohemianism|bohemian]], [[Mysticism|mystic]], [[Phonograph record|record]] collector, [[Hoarding|hoarder]], student of [[anthropology]] and a [[Gnosticism in modern times|Neo-Gnostic]] bishop.

Smith was an important figure in the [[Beat Generation]] scene in New York City, and his activities, such as his use of mind-altering substances and interest in [[Western esotericism|esoteric]] [[spirituality]], anticipated aspects of the [[History of the hippie movement|Hippie movement]]. Besides his films, such as his full length [[Cutout animation|cutout animated]] film ''[[Heaven and Earth Magic]]'' (1962), Smith is also remembered for his influential ''[[Anthology of American Folk Music]]'', drawn from his extensive collection of out-of-print commercial 78 rpm recordings.

Throughout his life Smith was an inveterate collector. Other than records, his collections included [[string figure]]s,<ref>A brochure accompanying an exhibit of Harry Smith's string figures stated that, "[f]irst described in Western anthropological literature by [[Franz Boas]] in 1888, these patterns – made by looping or weaving lengths of string into geometric forms or shapes that often evoke familiar objects – have been produced throughout history, both as a secular pastime and as a spiritual practice. When he died, Smith left an unfinished thousand-page manuscript on string figures, along with an extensive collection of figures that he had created", [http://www.e-flux.com/announcements/harry-smith-string-figures/ "Harry Smith: String Figures", Cabinet Gallery, Brooklyn, N.Y. (September 19 through November 3, 2012)]</ref> [[paper airplanes]], [[Seminole textiles]], and [[Ukrainian Easter eggs]].

==Biography==
Harry Smith was born in Portland, Oregon,<ref>{{cite book|title=501 Movie Directors|editor-first=Steven Jay|editor-last=Schneider|publisher=Cassell Illustrated|location=London|year=2007|page=270|isbn=9781844035731|oclc=1347156402}}</ref> and spent his earliest years in [[Washington (state)|Washington state]] in the area between [[Seattle]] and [[Bellingham, Washington|Bellingham]]. As a child he lived for a time with his family in [[Anacortes, Washington]], a town on [[Fidalgo Island]], where the [[Swinomish Reservation of Washington#Reservation|Swinomish Indian reservation]] is located.<ref>[[Ed Sanders]], biographical essay in Liner Notes to ''Harry Smith's Anthology of American Folk Music, Volume 4'', Revenant RVM 211 (2000), pp. 4–5.</ref> He attended high school in nearby Bellingham.

Smith's parents were [[Theosophism|Theosophists]] with [[Pantheism|Pantheistic]] tendencies (involving the belief in an [[Immanence|immanent]] God who is identical with the Universe or nature), and both were fond of folk music. His mother, Mary Louise, originally from [[Sioux City, Iowa]], came from a long line of school teachers and herself taught for a time on the [[Lummi people|Lummi]] Indian reservation near Bellingham. His father, Robert James Smith, a fisherman, worked as a watchman for the Pacific American Fishery, a salmon canning company. Smith's paternal great-grandfather, [[John C. Smith (politician)|John Corson Smith]] (d. 1910), had been a Union colonel in the [[American Civil War]], brevetted Brigadier General just as the war ended, and had served from 1885-89 as Lieutenant Governor of the state of Illinois. He had also been a prominent [[Freemasonry|Freemason]] and authored several books about the history of the order.<ref>[http://galenahistory.blogspot.com/2011/12/meet-generals-john-corson-smith.html "Meet the Generals: John Corson Smith"], Galena [Illinois] History (December, 2011).</ref>

Smith's parents, who did not get along, lived in separate houses, meeting only at dinner time. Although poor, they gave their son an artistic education, including 10 years of drawing and painting lessons. For a time, it is said, they even ran an art school in their house. Smith was also a voracious reader and he recalled his father bringing him a copy of [[Carl Sandburg]]'s folksong anthology, ''American Songbag''. "We were considered some kind of 'low' family", Smith once said, "despite my mother's feeling that she was [an incarnation of] the Czarina of Russia".<ref>[[Ed Sanders]], Liner Notes (2000), pp. 4–5.</ref> Friends recall that in high school Smith carried around a camera and in his high school yearbook said that he wanted to compose symphonic music.

Physically, Smith was undersized and had a curvature of the spine which kept him from being drafted (a circumstance that later would disqualify him from benefitting from the G.I. Bill). During World War II, he took a job as a mechanic working nights on the construction of the tight, hard-to-reach interior of Boeing bomber planes, for which his short stature suited him.<ref>John Cohen wrote: "Moe [Asch] first told me about Harry Smith, the man: that Smith was a little oddball guy – something of a hunchback – who had amassed his collection of 78 rpm records on the West Coast, and paid for it with his job working in the tight parts of World War II bombers." John Cohen in Liner Notes to ''Harry Smith's Anthology of American Folk Music, Volume 4'', Revenant RVM 211 (2000), pp. 32–33.</ref> Smith used the money he made from his job to buy blues records. The money also enabled him to study anthropology at the [[University of Washington]] in Seattle for five semesters between 1942 and the fall of 1944. He focused on American Indian tribes concentrated in the Pacific Northwest, making numerous field trips to document the music and customs of the [[Lummi people|Lummi]], whom he had gotten to know through his mother's work with them.<ref>Sanders, Liner Notes (2000) pp. 8–9.</ref>

When the war ended Smith, now 22, moved to the Bay Area of San Francisco, then home to a lively bohemian folk music and jazz scene. As a collector of blues records, he had already been corresponding with the noted blues record aficionado [[James McKune]]. He now also began seriously collecting old [[hillbilly]] music records from junk dealers and stores which were going out of business and even appeared as a guest on a folk music radio show hosted by poet [[Jack Spicer]].<ref>Sanders, Liner Notes (2000), p. 9.</ref> In 1948, his mother succumbed to cancer.<ref name="Sanders, Liner Notes 2000 p. 14">Sanders, Liner Notes (2000), p. 14.</ref> Immediately after her funeral, Smith, who was estranged from his father, left Berkeley for a room above a well known after-hours jazz club in the [[Fillmore District, San Francisco|Fillmore district]] of San Francisco. Smith was especially drawn to [[bebop]], a new jazz form which had originated during impromptu jam sessions before and after paid performances; and San Francisco abounded in night spots and after hours clubs where [[Dizzy Gillespie]] and [[Charlie Parker]] could be heard. At this time he painted several ambitious jazz-inspired abstract paintings (since destroyed) and began making animated [[avant garde]] films featuring patterns that he painted directly on the film stock and which were intended to be shown to the accompaniment of bebop music.<ref>Sanders, Liner Notes (2000), p. 10.</ref>

In 1950, Smith received a [[Guggenheim Fellowship|Guggenheim grant]] to complete an abstract film. This enabled him first to visit and later move to New York City.<ref>[http://www.harrysmitharchives.com/1_bio/index.html Biography of Harry Smith on Harry Smith Archives website] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110711145838/http://www.harrysmitharchives.com/1_bio/index.html |date=July 11, 2011 }}.</ref> He arranged for his collections, including his records, to be shipped to the East Coast. He said that "one reason he moved to New York was to study the [[Kabbalah|Cabala]]. And, 'I wanted to hear [[Thelonious Monk]] play'."<ref>quoted in Sanders, Liner Notes (2000), p. 11.</ref> When his grant money ran out, he brought what he termed "the cream of the crop"<ref name="Sanders, Liner Notes 2000 p. 14"/> of his record collection to [[Moe Asch]], president of [[Folkways Records]], with the idea of selling it. Instead, Asch proposed that the 27-year-old Smith use the material to edit a multi-volume anthology of American folk music in long playing format – then a newly developed, cutting edge medium – and he provided space and equipment in his office for Smith to work in. The recording engineer on the project was Péter Bartók, son of the renowned [[Béla Bartók|composer and folklorist]].

In this period and through the early 1960s, Smith became close to Lionel Ziprin, becoming a frequent houseguest. Ziprin supplied Smith with peyote, and introduced Smith to his Kabalist grandfather, Naftali Tzvi Margolies. Smith recorded many hours of audio with Margolies over a two year period.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Gill |first=John Freeman |date=2006-02-05 |title=Giving Voice to Sacred Prayers |language=en-US |work=The New York Times |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2006/02/05/nyregion/thecity/giving-voice-to-sacred-prayers.html |access-date=2023-12-21 |issn=0362-4331}}</ref>

===Anthologist of American folk music===
{{main|Anthology of American Folk Music}}
The resultant [[Folkways Records|Folkways]] anthology, issued in August 1952 under the title ''[[Anthology of American Folk Music]]'', was a compilation of recordings of folk music issued on [[Old-time music|hillbilly]] and [[race record]]s that had been released commercially on 78 rpm. These dated from the abbreviated dawn, sometimes called the "golden age",<ref>[[John Cohen (musician)|John Cohen]], Liner Notes to ''Harry Smith's Anthology of American Folk Music, Volume 4'' RVN 211 (2000) p. 40.</ref> of the commercial country music industry, that is, between 1927, when, as Smith explained, "[[acoustic recording]] {{sic}}<ref>Technically, they were [[Victor Orthophonic Victrola|"electric recordings"]], "acoustic recordings" were made by someone singing into a large trumpet, a practice that ended c. 1925.</ref> made possible accurate music reproduction, and 1932, when the Depression halted folk music sales",<ref>Harry Smith, "Foreword," to liner notes ''American Folk Music'', Folkways Records (1952).</ref> and the artists, in many cases, sank into obscurity. Originally issued as budget discs marketed to regional, rural audiences, these records had long been known, collected, and occasionally reissued by folklorists<ref>For example, Ronald D. Cohen writes, "John Lomax produced the [78 rpm] compilation album ''Smoky Mountain Ballads'' for RCA in 1941 [Victor P 79]. It included ten commercial recordings by [[Uncle Dave Macon]], the [[Carter Family]], Gil Tanner and his [[Skillet Lickers]], [[Bill Monroe]], and others [such as [[J. E. Mainer]]]. Alan would produce two similar compilations for Brunswick in 1947, ''Mountain Frolic'' and ''Listen to Our Story''," Ronald D. Cohen, editor, ''Alan Lomax Assistant in Charge: The Library of Congress Letters, 1935-1945'' (University of Mississippi Press, 2011) p. 390.</ref> and aficionados,<ref>"Hillbilly reissues were learned and performed by revival performers such as Pete Seeger, who credited his sources and suggested that people should copy them, not him", Neil V. Rosenberg, ''Bluegrass: A History'' (University of Illinois Press, 2005), p. 172.</ref> but this was the first time such a large compilation was made available to affluent, non-specialist urban dwellers. A scholar later commented that Smith was "not down in Appalachia with a tape recorder," as collectors in the 1930s had been, and he "wasn't interested in pure tradition, like there was a source." Instead, he continued, Smith was interested in "commercial recordings that were already packagings of music that he could organize."{{sfnp|Hochman|2001}}

[[LP record|LP]] discs could hold much more material than three-minute 78s, and had greater fidelity and far less [[surface noise]]. The Anthology was packaged as a set of three boxed albums with a total of 6 LPs. The front of each box a different color: red, blue, and green – in Smith's [[Schema (psychology)|schema]], representing the [[Alchemy|alchemical]] [[Classical element|elements]]. Priced at $25.00 per two-disc set, they were relatively expensive. For the money-challenged, Moe Asch maintained a retail record store in the 1950s near Union Square Park where he sold all 6 of the Anthology records for $1 each, as well as others from his catalogue. The $1 records were sold without their original jackets and with a hole punched through the label area to indicate that the record was remaindered and not to be sold for the full retail price. A fourth album, comprising topical songs from the Depression era, was originally planned by [[Moe Asch|Asch]] and his long-time assistant, Marian Distler, and never completed by Smith. It was issued in 2000, nine years after his death, in [[compact discs|CD]] format by [[Revenant Records]] with a 95-page booklet of tribute essays to Smith.<ref>Smith told Cohen that there were to be "four of them in the series." "Red, Blue, Green [symbolizing Fire, Air and Water] were issued, so that the element that was left out was Earth. The type of thinking that I applied to records, I still apply to other things like Seminole patchwork, or to Ukrainian Easter eggs" (Chelsea Hotel Interview, ''Sing Out!'' 4/5: 2–6 [1969], excerpted in Liner Notes to ''Harry Smith's Anthology of American Folk Music, Volume 4'', Revenant RVM 211 [2000], p. 33). In another interview, he said he had quarreled with Miss Distler over the song selection for the fourth volume (Interview conducted by Gary Kenton at the Breslin Hotel, NYC [1983], quoted in Liner Notes to ''Harry Smith's Anthology of American Folk Music, Volume 4'', Revenant RVM 211 [2000], p. 42).</ref>

The music on Smith's anthology, performed by such artists as [[Clarence Ashley]], [[Dock Boggs]], [[The Carter Family]], [[Sleepy John Estes]], [[Mississippi John Hurt]], [[Dick Justice (singer)|Dick Justice]], [[Blind Lemon Jefferson]], [[Buell Kazee]], and [[Bascom Lamar Lunsford]], greatly influenced the [[folk & blues revival]]s of the 1950s and 60s and were covered by [[The New Lost City Ramblers]], [[Bob Dylan]], and [[Joan Baez]], to name a few. Rock critic [[Greil Marcus]] in his liner-note essay for the 1997 Smithsonian reissue, quoted musician [[Dave van Ronk]]'s avowal that "We all knew every word of every song on it, including the ones we hated."<ref>Greil Marcus, "The Old, Weird America," liner notes to ''Anthology of American Folk Music'' (1997 CD reissue), Smithsonian Folkways Recordings.</ref>

Smith's presentation was a marked departure from the more social or politically oriented folk song collections of the 1930s and 40s. His annotations avoided localized historical and social commentary, consisting instead of terse, evocative synopses – riffs –  written in the manner of telegraph messages or newspaper headlines as though from an otherworldly realm, seemingly both timeless and [[avant-garde]]. For example, for [[Chubby Parker]]'s rendition of "King Kong Kitchie Kitchie Ki-Me-O" ("[[Frog Went A-Courting]]"), a ballad that has been traced to 1548, Smith wrote: "Zoologic Miscegeny Achieved Mouse Frog Nuptuals{{sic}}, Relatives Approve."

Smith was also unique in associating folk music with the occult: the design he chose to be printed on the box covers, for example, was taken from an engraving by [[Theodore de Bry]] of a great hand tuning the Celestial [[monochord#Monochord practitioners|Monochord]] (the one-stringed instrument symbolizing the music of the spheres), that had illustrated a sixteenth-century treatise on music by the Elizabethan magus [[Robert Fludd]].<ref>So successful was Smith's mediation strategy in presenting these 1920s country artists as uncanny voices from the beyond – "the old, weird America", in [[Greil Marcus]]'s memorable phrase – that the 1960s folk revivalists were astonished to find that many of these artists from forty years earlier were still very much alive.  "What was then called "old timey" music ... at the time was about as far in the past as the Beatles are today," [[Peter Stampfel]] has observed. See [http://www.furious.com/perfect/harrysmith.html Peter Stampfel, "Harry Smith Tribute, May. 1997", ''Perfect Sound Forever Online Magazine''.] Thanks to Smith's Anthology, several of these performers subsequently went on to have revived musical careers.</ref>

Smith told interviewer [[John Cohen (musician)|John Cohen]] that he had first heard this kind of record at the home of [[Bertrand Harris Bronson]], the eminent English professor and ballad scholar,<ref>"As a teacher [Bronson] had, as he liked to say, four quills in his quiver, Chaucer, Shakespeare, Johnson and his age, and the musicology of the ballad, and he had devoted students in each of these domains. They honored him by two ''festschriften'': ''The Ballad Image: Essays Presented to B. H. Bronson'', edited by James Porter, Center for Comparative Study of Folklore and Mythology, UCLA (1983); and ''Essays in Honor of B. H. Bronson'', edited by Robert Maccubbin and Oliver Sigworth, ''Eighteenth Century Life'' 10: 3." See [http://content.cdlib.org/view?docId=hb767nb3z6&doc.view=frames&chunk.id=div00016&toc.depth=1&toc.id=  "Bertrand H. Bronson (1903–86), Professor emeritus, English, University of California, Berkeley".]</ref> who collected them. In 1946 Smith reportedly lived for a time in small room with a separate entrance on the first floor of Bronson's Berkeley residence, and it is thought he may have received informal tutelage in folk music through his acquaintance with the scholar.{{sfnp|Perchuk|Singh|2010|pp=22, 176–78}}

Smith also told Cohen that in selecting his material he relied heavily on the [[Library of Congress]]'s mimeographed "List of American Folk Songs on Commercial Records", a monograph compiled by [[Alan Lomax]] in 1940 with the assistance of [[Pete Seeger]], that Lomax and Seeger had sent out to folk song scholars (and which could also be purchased directly from the Library for 25 cents).<ref>See John Swzed, ''Alan Lomax, The Man Who Recorded the World'' (New York, London: Viking, 2011), pp. 223–24. Nathan Salsburg writes:<blockquote>Of the estimated (by Szwed) 3000 titles Lomax and Seeger listened to, Alan selected 350 for inclusion in a Library of Congress monograph called the "List of American Folk Songs on Commercial Records," published in a September 1940 Report of the Committee of the Conference on Inter-American Relations in the Field of Music. This was the first methodological research made into the pre-war commercial record companies' documentation of rural vernacular music and, despite its main shortcoming — the fact that the team had little or no access to titles from the Gennett or OKeh catalogs — it proved to be a highly influential road-map for at least two of the earliest and most influential collectors of this music, Harry Smith and James McKune, who in turn paved the way for the many years that followed of its further excavation, investigation, and publication — which, of course, continue apace today ([http://roothogordie.wordpress.com/2012/09/24/alan-lomaxs-list-of-american-folk-songs-on-commercial-records/ Nathan Salsburg, "Alan Lomax's, 'List of American Folk Songs on Commercial Records', Library of Congress, 1940", ''Root Hog or Die'', September 24, 2012.])</blockquote></ref>

Cohen asked Smith: "Where did you first hear of the Carter Family?"

{{blockquote|'''Smith:''' I would think from that mimeographed list that the Library of Congress issued around 1937 {{sic}}, "American Folksongs on Commercially Available Records" {{sic}}. Shortly after that, two Carter Family recordings, "Worried Man Blues" and "East Virginia Blues" were reissued on the album ''Smoky Mountain Ballads''. That album would come to stores that wouldn't ordinarily have Carter Family records.

'''John Cohen:''' In that album John and Alan Lomax made hillbilly music respectable enough to have it sold along with art music and symphonies.{{sfnp|Cohen|1969}}
}}

Twelve of the 60 songs and many of the artists on Lomax and Seeger's "List" appear in Smith's anthology and his notes credit the Lomaxes. Smith explained that he had selected material based on what he thought would be of interest to scholars and to people who might like to sing them.<ref>"You couldn't get a representative cross-section of music into such a small number of records [six LPs]. Instead, they were selected to be ones that would be popular among musicologists, or possibly with people who would want to sing them and maybe would improve the version. They were basically picked out from an epistemological, musicological selection of reasons" ({{harvp|Cohen|1969}}). However, Smith also insisted that in deciding what to put in and what to leave out, "The first criterion was excellence in performance, combined with excellence of words." ({{harvp|Cohen|1969}}).</ref> He also told Cohen that, "I felt social change would result from it. I'd been reading [[The Republic (Plato)|Plato's Republic]]. He's jabbering about music, how you have to be careful about changing the music, because it might upset or destroy the government. Everybody gets out of step. You are not to arbitrarily change it because you may undermine the Empire State Building without knowing it. Of course, I thought it would do that ... I imagined it as having some kind of social force for good".{{sfnp|Cohen|1969}}

In 1991, shortly before his death, Smith was the recipient of a [[Grammy]], the Chairman's Merit Award for Lifetime Achievement. Ed Sanders writes:

<blockquote>It was a joy to his many friends to see him clambering up the Grammy steps wearing a tuxedo. "I'm glad to say that my dreams came true – I saw America changed through music," he told the audience. Plato was right, music can change the direction of a civilization, for worse or better.<ref>Sanders, Liner Notes [2000], p. 30).</ref></blockquote>

In 1997, Smith's collection was re-released as a boxed set of six [[compact discs|CDs]] on [[Folkways Records|Smithsonian Folkways Recordings]], as the ''Anthology of American Folk Music'' (now also informally referred to as "The Harry Smith Anthology").

In his notes to a 2006 revival CD, [[Elvis Costello]] wrote: "We're lucky that somebody compiled the ''Anthology'' as intelligently and as imaginatively so that it can tell a series of stories to future musicians and listeners, and be a starting point."<ref>Elvis Costello, Liner Note to  ''The Harry Smith Project: The Anthology of American Folk Music Revisited'', Sony BMG Music Entertainment CD (2006).</ref>

A conference, "Harry Smith: The Avant Garde in the American Vernacular," was held in 1991 at University of California at Los Angeles.{{sfnp|Hochman|2001}}

===Other recording projects===
In the 1950s, Smith recorded a 15-LP set of Rabbi Nuftali Zvi Margolies Abulafia, grandfather of [[Lionel Ziprin]]. Smith became interested in recording Rabbi Abulafia after hearing him chanting and recorded the set of chants and prayers in the Rabbi's synagogue. Due to difficulties in finding a suitable record label, the complete set remains unreleased.<ref>{{Cite news|title=A Grandson's Quest to Preserve His Jewish Heritage|url=https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5076613|access-date=2020-07-03|website=NPR.org|language=en}}</ref>

In addition to compiling the Folkways anthology, Smith was also instrumental in getting Folkways to produce ''[[The Fugs First Album]]'', on its Broadside label in 1965. A regular visitor to the Peace Eye bookstore, in Manhattan's [[East Village, Manhattan|East Village]] on 10th Street between Avenues B and Ave C, founded in 1965 by poet [[Ed Sanders]], Smith had advised Sanders which books about Native American studies the store ought to stock. When Sanders and [[Tuli Kupferberg]] formed the [[The Fugs|Fugs]], they rehearsed at Peace Eye. "Thanks to Harry," writes Sanders, "the band was able to record an album within weeks of forming."<ref>Sanders, Liner Notes (2000), p. 21.</ref> [[Peter Stampfel]] recalled that, as the album's editor and producer, "Harry's contribution to the proceedings were his presence, inspiration, and best of all, smashing a wine bottle against the wall while we were recording 'Nothing,'"<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.furious.com/perfect/harrysmith.html|title=Harry Smith tribute|website=Furious.com}}</ref> But Sanders recalled learning a lot from watching Smith's adept, businesslike tape editing at the Folkways studio, adding that, as far as he knew, Smith received no financial reward for his work. He asked for a bottle of rum, which Sanders bought for him, and then proceeded to smash the bottle against the wall, to "spur us to greater motivity and energy", Sanders speculated.{{sfnp|Sanders|2011|p=142}}

In 1971–73, Smith recorded performances held at his room at the [[Hotel Chelsea]] (for a project called "deonage") of, among other things, spontaneously composed folk and protest songs written and performed by his long-time friend, [[Allen Ginsberg]], accompanying himself on the [[Pump organ|harmonium]]. These included, "CIA Dope Calypso", "MacDougal Street Blues", "Bus Ride Ballad Ride to Suva", and "Dope Fiend Blues", among others, all later issued on an LP entitled ''New York Blues: Rags, Ballads and Harmonium Songs'' (Folkways, 1981).

In keeping with his interest in chemically altered states of consciousness, Smith made field recordings documenting Kiowa peyote meeting songs, which Folkways issued as a multi-LP set.

===Experimental films===
Critical attention has been most often paid to Smith's [[experimental film|experimental work with film]]. He produced extravagant abstract animations. The effects were often painted or manipulated by hand [[Direct Films|directly]] on the [[celluloid]]. Themes of mysticism, [[surrealism]] and [[dada]] were common elements in his work.<ref>The main sources of the filmography: Harry Smith Archives ({{cite web |title=Curriculum Vitae |url=http://www.harrysmitharchives.com/1_bio/cv.html |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20051126014437/http://www.harrysmitharchives.com/1_bio/cv.html |archive-date=November 26, 2005 |access-date=2006-08-29 |df=mdy-all}} & {{cite web |title=Archived copy |url=http://www.harrysmitharchives.com/3_store/index.html |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20050213172853/http://harrysmitharchives.com/3_store/index.html |archive-date=February 13, 2005 |access-date=2005-01-31 |df=mdy-all}}), [[Anthology Film Archives]] ([http://www.anthologyfilmarchives.org/schedule/?start=2006-9-15&end=2006-9-21]) & [http://www.anthologyfilmarchives.org/schedule/?start=2006-3-01&end=2006-3-07]), Krugman Associates ({{cite web |title=Krugman Associates Inc. - Search Page |url=http://www.krugmaninc.com/title_jump.asp?TITLE=EARLY+ABSTRACTIONS |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070818013246/http://www.krugmaninc.com/title_jump.asp?TITLE=EARLY+ABSTRACTIONS |archive-date=August 18, 2007 |access-date=2006-08-30 |df=mdy-all}}, {{cite web |title=Krugman Associates Inc. - Search Page |url=http://www.krugmaninc.com/title_jump.asp?TITLE=HEAVEN+AND+EARTH+MAGIC |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070818013304/http://www.krugmaninc.com/title_jump.asp?TITLE=HEAVEN+AND+EARTH+MAGIC |archive-date=August 18, 2007 |access-date=2006-08-30 |df=mdy-all}} &
{{cite web |title=Krugman Associates Inc. - Search Page |url=http://www.krugmaninc.com/title_jump.asp?TITLE=LATE+SUPERIMPOSITIONS |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070819011547/http://www.krugmaninc.com/title_jump.asp?TITLE=LATE+SUPERIMPOSITIONS |archive-date=August 19, 2007 |access-date=2006-08-30 |df=mdy-all}}, [https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0808421 IMDb], articles by [http://www.sensesofcinema.com/2005/36/harry_smith/ Jamie Sexton], [[Dirk de Bruyn]], [http://www.sensesofcinema.com/2005/cteq/early_abstractions/ "Both Senses of Cinema"], [http://www.historylink.org/essays/output.cfm?file_id=7635 Eric L. Flom] (HistoryLink.org), [http://www.kiez-ev.de/biografien/smith-harry Thomas Steinberg] {{Webarchive|url=https://archive.today/20130211071214/http://www.kiez-ev.de/biografien/smith-harry|date=February 11, 2013}} (Kiez e.V., in German), [http://www.arte.tv/fr/cinema-fiction/Court-circuit/Emission_20du_20mardi_209_20septembre_202003/343314,CmC=343320.html Nicole Brenez] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070818090612/http://www.arte.tv/fr/cinema-fiction/Court-circuit/Emission_20du_20mardi_209_20septembre_202003/343314,CmC=343320.html|date=August 18, 2007}} ([[Arte]], in French, also in [http://www.arte.tv/de/film/kurzschluss/Sendung_20vom_20Dienstag_2009._20September_202003/343314,CmC=343320.html German] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070818090650/http://www.arte.tv/de/film/kurzschluss/Sendung_20vom_20Dienstag_2009._20September_202003/343314,CmC=343320.html|date=August 18, 2007}}), the [http://www.centrepompidou.fr/Pompidou/Manifs.nsf/AllCycle/Harry%20Smith%20(1923-1991)%20un%20mage%20américain?OpenDocument&sessionM=&L=1 Centre Pompidou] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070819234701/http://www.centrepompidou.fr/Pompidou/Manifs.nsf/AllCycle/Harry%20Smith%20%281923-1991%29%20un%20mage%20am%C3%A9ricain?OpenDocument&sessionM=&L=1|date=August 19, 2007}} (in French), [http://www.seances.org/fr/cycle.asp?id=223 Séances] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060529110653/http://seances.org/fr/cycle.asp?id=223|date=May 29, 2006}} (in French), [http://www.re-voir.com/html/smith.htm Re:Voir] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070928154149/http://www.re-voir.com/html/smith.htm|date=September 28, 2007}}, the [http://www.filmpreservation.org/preserved/filmdesc.php?id=283 National Film Preservation Foundation] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081231164349/http://www.filmpreservation.org/preserved/filmdesc.php?id=283|date=December 31, 2008}}, [http://www.film-makerscoop.com/catalog/s.html The Film-Makers' Cooperative], the [http://nwfilmforum.org/cinemas/smith.php Northwest Film Forum] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20061011120004/http://www.nwfilmforum.org/cinemas/smith.php|date=October 11, 2006}}, the [http://www.e.bell.ca/filmfest/cinematheque/about_news_sub.asp?pressID=112 Cinematheque Ontario] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060212221755/http://www.e.bell.ca/filmfest/cinematheque/about_news_sub.asp?pressID=112|date=February 12, 2006}}, the [http://www.debalie.nl/artikel.jsp;jsessionid=A0FBA4CF0370389D79F93D94059CA5D1?podiumid=cinema&articleid=27006 Debalie Cinema] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070821233619/http://www.debalie.nl/artikel.jsp;jsessionid=A0FBA4CF0370389D79F93D94059CA5D1?podiumid=cinema&articleid=27006|date=August 21, 2007}}, the [http://3cinema.art.pl/ludzie.php?harrysmith 3cinema] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070928192733/http://3cinema.art.pl/ludzie.php?harrysmith|date=September 28, 2007}} (in Polish), the [http://www.roberthaller.com/firstlight/smith.html filmography] from {{harvp|Igliori|1996}}, and Hans Scheugl/Ernst Schmid jr.: ''Eine Subgeschichte des Films. Lexikon des Avantgarde-, Experimental- und Undergroundfilms''. [[Frankfurt am Main]]: [[Suhrkamp Verlag]] 1974 (edition suhrkamp 471), vol. 2, pp.&nbsp;844–847.</ref>

Information, especially about Smith's early films, is uncertain, due to the work-in-progress nature of experimental filmmaking. He frequently reedited them (hence the different runtimes), incorporating on various occasions reassembled footage of different film to be viewed with varying music tracks. For instance, the handmade films now known as No. 1, 2, 3, and 5 were accompanied by an improvising jazz band on May 12, 1950 when they premiered as part of the ''Art in Cinema'' series curated by Smith's friend [[Frank Stauffacher]] at the [[San Francisco Museum of Modern Art|San Francisco Museum of Art]], though Smith had originally intended them to be accompanied by recordings of beat favorite [[Dizzy Gillespie]]. Later he showed the films with random records or even the radio as accompaniment. Smith stated that his films were made for contemporary music, and he kept changing their soundtracks. At the urging of his friend Rosemarie "Rosebud" Feliu-Pettet, Smith also re-cut ''[[Early Abstractions]]'' to sync with ''[[Meet the Beatles!]]''. After Smith's death, artists such as [[John Zorn]], [[Philip Glass]] or [[DJ Spooky]] provided musical backgrounds for screenings of his films: Zorn at many screenings at [[Anthology Film Archives]] (where he is composer-in-residence) as part of his Essential Cinema project, Glass at the 2004 summer benefit concert of [[the Film-Makers' Cooperative]] and DJ Spooky at several venues in 1999 for ''Harry Smith: A Re-creation'', an embroidered compendium of Smith's films put together by his close collaborator [[M. Henry Jones]] who tries to screen the films in the manner intended by Smith - as performances - using stroboscopic effects, multiple projections, magic lanterns, and the like.<ref>[http://www.centerforvisualmusic.org/VMFilms.htm VMFilms] Center for Visual Music, Los Angeles
</ref><ref>[http://www.austinchronicle.com/gyrobase/Issue/story?oid=oid%3A74669 Chris Baker: A Waking Dream] ([[Austin Chronicle]])
</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=http://legacy.aintitcool.com/node/4689|title=Robogeek reports on a local cool cinema event in Austin|website=Legacy.aintitcool.com|access-date=November 4, 2023}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.citypages.com/databank/20/958/article7464.asp|title=City Pages - Reconstructing Harry|date=September 11, 2005|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20050911022222/http://www.citypages.com/databank/20/958/article7464.asp |access-date=November 4, 2023|archive-date=September 11, 2005 }}</ref>

The present-day numbering system which Smith introduced some time between 1951 and 1964–65 (the year [[the Film-Makers' Cooperative]] started distributing 16&nbsp;mm copies of his films) includes only films that survived up to that point. Thus this filmography is in no way a comprehensive list of all the films he has ever made, all the more as he is known to have lost, sold, traded or even wantonly destroyed some of his own works. The dating of the film presents another puzzle. Since Smith frequently worked for years on them and kept little to no documentation, the information varies considerably from one source to another. Therefore all available information has been added to the following list, inevitably resulting in a loss of clarity but having the advantage of giving the whole picture. The films are also known by variant designation, i.e. ''Film No. 1'', ''Film # 1'' or simply ''# 1''.

Since the 1970s, Smith's films have been archived and preserved by [[Anthology Film Archives]] in New York City.

The Academy Film Archive preserved "Abstractions," films 1-3 by Harry Smith.<ref>{{cite web|title=Preserved Projects|url=http://www.oscars.org/academy-film-archive/preserved-projects?title=&filmmaker=harry+smith&category=All&collection=All|website=Academy Film Archive}}</ref>

===Visual art===
Smith's early efforts in the field of [[fine art]] painting were [[:wikt:freeform|freeform]] [[abstraction]]s intended to visually represent notes, measures, [[Beat (music)|beats]] and [[riff]]s of the [[beatnik|beatnik era]] [[jazz music]] that [[muse|inspired]] him.

There is photographic evidence of Smith's large paintings created in the 1940s; however, the works themselves were destroyed by Smith himself. He did not destroy his work on film (although he did misplace a few) and this legacy supplements the nature and design of his paintings. Smith created several later works, some of which have been serially printed in limited editions. Much of his imagery is inspired by [[Hermetic Qabalah|Kabbalistic]] themes such as the [[Sephirah]], where the [[Planetary spheres|Planetary Spheres]] are distributed like musical notes upon a staff.

===Occult interests===
Smith said he had become acquainted with the [[Lummi people|Lummi]] Indians through his mother's teaching work and claimed to have participated in [[shaman|shamanic initiation]] at a young age. He recorded Lummi songs and rituals using homemade equipment and notation of his own devising, and had an important collection of Native American religious objects.

[[Tarot]] was another of Smith's interests. A set of "irregularly-shaped Tarot cards" he designed was apparently used for the degree certificates for a branch of [[Ordo Templi Orientis]] founded by occultist [[Aleister Crowley]].<ref name="Sanders, Liner Notes 2000 p. 24">Sanders, Liner Notes (2000), p. 24.</ref> In the late 1940s in California Smith is said to have worked with [[Charles Stansfeld Jones]], the one-time acolyte of Crowley. Smith would later study under Jones's "trusted student", Albert Handel<ref>{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=j3uVfRl9kWEC&dq=albert+handel&pg=PR30|title=Liber Aleph Vel CXI: The Book of Wisdom Or Folly, in the Form an Epistle of 666, the Great Wild Beast to His Son 777, Being the Equinox, Volume III Number VI|first=Aleister|last=Crowley|date=January 1, 1991|publisher=Weiser Books|isbn=9780877287292 |via=Google Books}}</ref> in New York.

Smith frequented the [[Weiser Antiquarian Books|Samuel Weiser Antiquarian Bookstore]], a used book store on New York's "Book Row" that specialized in works on [[comparative religion]], [[hermeticism]], and the [[occult]]. The store's publishing house, Weiser Books, used Smith's designs for its paperback edition of Aleister Crowley's ''[[Holy Books of Thelema]]''.<ref name="Sanders, Liner Notes 2000 p. 24"/>

[[Ed Sanders|Sanders]] recounts that Smith was the key advisor for [[Allen Ginsberg]] and [[The Fugs]]'s effort to levitate [[The Pentagon]]. "In the fall of 1967", Sanders wrote:

<blockquote> a bunch of us decided to exorcise the demons from the Pentagon as part of a big demonstration against the Vietnam War. (You can get a flavor of that day from [[Norman Mailer]]'s ''[[Armies of the Night]]''.) I was in charge of coming up with a structure for the Exorcism. I knew Harry would know what to do so I conferred with him. He gave me the basic outline, which was to use the symbols of the four directions, and to use the symbols of earth, air, fire, and water. He also suggested adding a cow, to represent the Goddess Hathor. We did have a cow prepared, painted with mythic symbols, but the police stopped it from getting near the Pentagon. The Exorcism was duly recorded by WBAI's Bob Fass, and can be found on the Fugs album ''Tenderness Junction''.<ref name="Sanders, Liner Notes 2000 p. 24"/></blockquote>

Smith also studied the [[Enochian magic|Enochian]] system in depth and as it was recounted by [[Edward Kelley]] and [[John Dee]], which was later elaborated upon by the [[Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn]] and the aforementioned OTO. He compiled a concordance of the [[Enochian language]] with the aid of Khem Caigan, his assistant throughout much of the 1970s and early 1980s.{{cn|date=June 2024}}

In 1986 Smith was consecrated a bishop in the [[Ecclesia Gnostica Catholica]], an order which lists [[William Blake]] and [[Giordano Bruno]] in its pantheon of saints. Smith was long a familiar figure in the New York branch of the OTO.<ref name="Sanders, Liner Notes 2000 p. 24"/> In 2023, Smith was accorded a very rare honor of being canonized a Gnostic Saint in the [[Ecclesia Gnostica Catholica]] by Hymenaeus Beta, the head of the EGC.<ref>{{Cite web|title=HYMENAEUS BETA'S CANONIZATION OF HARRY EVERETT SMITH| date=August 8, 2023 |url=https://zeroequalstwo.net/hymenaeus-betas-canonization-of-harry-everett-smith/}}</ref>

===Later life and death===
Smith lived at the [[Hotel Chelsea]] on West 23rd Street in New York City, residing in Room #731 from 1968 to 1977, after which he was "sometimes 'stranded' at hotels where he would owe so much money he couldn't leave, and he was too famous just to be thrown out".<ref>Sanders, Liner Notes (2000) p. 26</ref> This was the case at the Breslin Hotel at 28th and Broadway, where Smith lived until 1985, when his friend, poet Allen Ginsberg, took him into his home on East 12th Street. While living with Ginsberg, Smith designed the cover for two of Ginsberg's books, ''White Shroud'' and ''Collected Poems'', as well as continuing to work on his own films and to record ambient sounds. For many years he subsisted on a diet of raw eggs, vodka and amphetamine tablets.{{citation needed|date=September 2014}} By this time, Smith was suffering from severe health and dental problems and proved a difficult guest. Ginsberg's psychiatrist finally told him that Smith would have to leave because he was bad for Ginsberg's blood pressure (Ginsberg was already suffering from the cardiovascular disease that would end his life). In 1988, Ginsberg arranged for Smith to teach shamanism at the Naropa Institute (now [[Naropa University]]) in Boulder, Colorado. When Ginsberg, who was paying all of Smith's expenses, realized Smith was using the money he was sending him for rent to buy alcohol, he hired Rani Singh, then a student at Naropa, to look after him, but not before Smith had amassed substantial debts that Ginsberg would be responsible for.<ref>Bill Morgan, ''I Celebrate Myself: The Somewhat Private Life of Allen Ginsberg'' (Viking Group, 2006), p. 607.</ref> Singh, now an author and art curator, has since devoted much of her life to furthering Smith's legacy.

Smith returned to New York, staying for a while with friends in Cooperstown, New York, and ending up at one point at Francis House, a home for derelicts on the Bowery. All the while, he continued to tape ambient sounds, including "the dying coughs and prayers of impoverished sick people in adjacent cubicles."<ref>Allen Ginsberg quoted in Sanders, Liner Notes (2000) p. 29</ref>

In November 1991, Smith suffered a bleeding ulcer followed by cardiac arrest in Room 328 at the [[Hotel Chelsea]] in [[New York City]]. His friend, poet [[Paola Igliori]], described him as dying in her arms, "singing as he drifted away".<ref>{{Citation |url= http://www.indiewire.com/2011/08/grey-matters-young-and-old-memories-of-the-hotel-chelsea-232826/ |title=GREY MATTERS: Young and old memories of the Hotel Chelsea |access-date=2011-12-05|publisher=[[IndieWire]]|date=2011-08-12|author=Ian Grey|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171212032133if_/http://www.indiewire.com/2011/08/grey-matters-young-and-old-memories-of-the-hotel-chelsea-232826/|archive-date=2017-12-12}}</ref> Smith was pronounced dead one hour later at [[St. Vincent's Hospital (Manhattan)|St. Vincent's Hospital]].

Following Smith's death, his branch of the OTO performed a [[Liber XV, The Gnostic Mass|Gnostic Mass]] in his honor at [[St. Mark's Church in-the-Bowery|St. Mark's Church]] in the [[East Village, Manhattan|East Village]].<ref name="Sanders, Liner Notes 2000 p. 24"/> Smith's ashes were placed in the care of his friend, longtime participant in New York's [[Beat Generation|Beat]] scene, Rosemarie "Rosebud" Feliu-Pettet, whom Paola Igliori has described as Smith's "spiritual wife."<ref>[http://www.allenginsberg.org/index.php?page=paola-igliori-interview-on-harry-smith Allen Ginsberg & Paola Igliori, 24 September 1995], at the AllenGinsberg.org</ref>

==Filmography==
*''[[Early Abstractions]]'' (1939-56 or 1941-57 or 1946-52 or 1946-57) (assembled ca. 1964) 16&nbsp;mm, black & white and color, 22 min. Originally silent, then accompanied by a reel-to-reel tape with songs by [[The Fugs]]—whose [[The Fugs First Album|first album]] Smith produced, and subsequently by an optical soundtrack featuring ''[[Meet the Beatles!]]''. The 1987 video release features [[Teiji Ito]]'s musical piece ''Shaman''. At first, the anthology included only No. 1-4, later No. 5, 7, and 10 were added. The individual films however are not divided, they play as one. This anthology was inducted into the [[National Film Registry]] in 2006.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.loc.gov/programs/national-film-preservation-board/film-registry/complete-national-film-registry-listing/ |title=Complete National Film Registry Listing |publisher= National Film Preservation Board}}</ref>
*''No. 1: A Strange Dream'' (1939-47 or 1946-48) hand-painted 35&nbsp;mm stock photographed in 16&nbsp;mm, color, silent, 2:20 or 5 min. Initially intended to be screened with and synchronized to [[Dizzy Gillespie]]'s "[[Manteca (song)|Manteca]]" or "Guarachi Guaro". "... the history of the [[geologic period]] reduced to [[orgasm]] length."
*''No. 2: Message From the Sun'' (1940-42 or 1946-48) hand-painted 35&nbsp;mm stock photographed in 16&nbsp;mm, color, 2:15 or 10 min. Initially intended to be screened with and synchronized to [[Dizzy Gillespie]]'s "Algo Bueno" (also known as "[[Woody 'n' You]]"). This film "takes place either inside the [[sun]] or in ... [[Switzerland]]" according to Smith. To produce this film he used a technique that involved cutting stickers of the type used to reinforce the holes in 3-ring binder paper. These were applied to 16&nbsp;mm movie film and used like a stencil. Layers of vaseline and paint were used to color each frame in this manner. The effect is [[hypnosis|hypnotic]], [[psychedelic art|psychedelic]] and is something like a visual music.
*''No. 3: Interwoven'' (1942-47 or 1947-49) hand-painted 35&nbsp;mm stock photographed in 16&nbsp;mm, color, 3:20 or 10 min. Reportedly cut down from about 30 min. Initially intended to be screened with and synchronized to [[Dizzy Gillespie]]'s "Guarachi Guaro" or "Manteca". "Batiked animation made of dead squares ..." (Available on the DVD collection ''[[Treasures IV: American Avant-Garde Film, 1947-1986]]'' (2008).
*''No. 4: Fast Track'' a.k.a. "Manteca" (1947 or 1949-50) 16&nbsp;mm, black & white and color, 2:16 or 6 min. Silent though possibly intended to be screened with [[Dizzy Gillespie]]'s ''Manteca''. The film starts with a color sequence showing Smith's painting ''[https://web.archive.org/web/20070731081202/http://www.harrysmitharchives.com/2_artwork/art2.html Manteca]'' (ca. 1950) with which he tried to subjectively depict Gillespie's song, every brushstroke representing a music note. The film concludes with black & white superimpositions.
*''No. 5: Circular Tensions (Homage to [[Oskar Fischinger]])'' (1949–50) 16&nbsp;mm, color, silent, 2:30 or 6 min. Sequel to No. 4.
*''No. 6'' (1948-51 or 1950-51) 16&nbsp;mm, color, silent or mono, 1:30 or 20 min. Untraced red-green [[Anaglyph image|anaglyph]] [[3-D film]].
*''No. 7: Color Study'' (1950-51-52) 16&nbsp;mm, color, silent, 5:25 or 15 min. "Optically printed [[Pythagoreanism]] in four [[movement (music)|movement]]s supported on squares, circles, grillwork, and triangles with an interlude concerning an experiment."
*''No. 8'' (1954 or 1957) 16&nbsp;mm, black & white, silent, 5 min. Untraced collage. Later expanded to No. 12.
*''No. 9'' (1954 or 1957) 16&nbsp;mm, color, 10 min. Untraced collage.
*''No. 10: Mirror Animations'' (1956–57) 16&nbsp;mm, color, 3:35 or 10 min. Study for No. 11. "An exposition of [[Buddhism]] and the [[Hermetic Qabalah|Kaballah]] in the form of a collage. The final scene shows [[Amanita muscaria|Agaric mushroom]]s growing on the [[moon]] while the [[Hero]] and [[Heroine]] row by on a [[Telencephalon|cerebrum]]."
*''No. 11: Mirror Animations'' (1956–57) 16&nbsp;mm, color, 3:35 or 8 min. Features [[Thelonious Monk]]'s "Misterioso". [[Cut-up technique|Cut-up]] and [[collage]] [[animation]]. Later expanded to No. 17.
*''No. 12: [[Heaven and Earth Magic]]'' a.k.a. ''The Magic Feature'' a.k.a. ''Heaven and Earth Magic Feature'' (1943-58 or 1950-60 or 1950-61 or 1957-62 or 1959-61) (reedited several times between 1957–62) 16&nbsp;mm, black & white, mono, initially 6 hours, later versions of 2 hours and 67 min. Extended version of No. 8. [[Collage]] [[animation]] culled from 19th century catalogs meant to be shown using custom-made projectors fit out with color filters (gels, wheels, etc.) and masking hand-painted glass slides to alter the projected image. Smith explains, "The first part depicts the heroine's [[toothache]] consequent to the loss of a very valuable [[watermelon]], her [[dentistry]] and [[transport]]ation to [[heaven]]. Next follows an elaborate exposition of the heavenly land, in terms of [[Israel]] and [[Montreal]]. The second part depicts the return to [[Earth]] from being eaten by [[Max Müller]] on the day [[Edward VII of the United Kingdom|Edward VII]] dedicated the Great Sewer of [[London]]." [[Jonas Mekas]] gave the film—which is often regarded as Smith's major work—its title in 1964/65.
*''No. 13: Oz'' a.k.a. ''The Magic Mushroom People of Oz'' (1962) 35&nbsp;mm widescreen ([[CinemaScope|scope]]), color, stereo, 3 hours or 108 min. but only 20-30 min. are known to survive. Unfinished commercial adaptation of [[L. Frank Baum]]'s ''[[The Wonderful Wizard of Oz]]'' which was shelved after Smith's close friend, the executive producer and primary financial backer [[Arthur M. Young|Arthur Young]] died of cancer. Portions released as No. 16, 19, and 20. From the reported three to six hours of camera test footage (rushes) only ca. 15 minutes, in the form of non-color-corrected rushes, is known to be extant. The only completed part is ''The Approach to Emerald City'', a 5 (other sources say 9 resp. 12) minute sequence set to music from [[Charles Gounod]]'s ''[[Faust (opera)|Faust]]''.<ref>See sources: {{cite web |url=http://www.ozclub.org/reference/filmog1940.asp |title=The Oz Filmography - Part 3 - 1940-1969 |access-date=2006-08-29 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20061001194804/http://www.ozclub.org/reference/filmog1940.asp |archive-date=October 1, 2006 |df=mdy-all }}, {{cite web |url=http://www.ozclub.org/reference/oztl1957.htm |title=1957-1969b |access-date=2006-08-29 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060812102916/http://www.ozclub.org/reference/oztl1957.htm |archive-date=August 12, 2006 |df=mdy-all }}. See credits on [https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0056294/combined IMDb].</ref>
*''No. 14: Late Superimpositions'' (1963-64-65) 16&nbsp;mm, color, 29 min. Structured 122333221. Features the beginning of the opera ''[[Aufstieg und Fall der Stadt Mahagonny]]'' by [[Kurt Weill]] and [[Bertolt Brecht]] as recorded in 1956 by [[Lotte Lenya]], the ''[[NDR Chor]]'' ([[Max Thurn]]) and the ''[[NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchestra|Norddeutsches Radio-Orchester]]'' (Wilhelm Brückner-Rüggeberg). Later expanded to No. 18. "I honor it the most of my films, otherwise a not very popular one before 1972." Shot in [[New York City]] and [[Anadarko, Oklahoma|Anadarko]].
*''No. 15'' (1965–1966) 16&nbsp;mm, color, silent, 10 min. Animation of [[Seminole patchwork]].
*''No. 16: Oz - The Tin Woodman's Dream'' (1967) 35&nbsp;mm widescreen ([[CinemaScope|scope]]), color, silent, 14:30 min. Consists of ''The Approach to Emerald City'' (cf. note on No. 13) followed by about 10 minutes of kaleidoscopic footage shot ca. 1966.<ref>See credits and plot summary on [https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0440697/combined IMDb].</ref> See also No. 20.
*''No. 17: Mirror Animations (extended version)'' (1962-76 or 1979) 16&nbsp;mm, color, 12 min. Features [[Thelonious Monk]]'s "Misterioso". Extended version of No. 11 printed forward-backward-forward.
*''No. 18: Mahagonny'' (1970-1980: shot 70-72, edited 72-80) 16&nbsp;mm, color, tetraptych screen (initially with four 16&nbsp;mm projectors, now composited onto a single 35&nbsp;mm strip), 141 min. (edited down from over 11 hours of material). With [[Allen Ginsberg]], [[Jonas Mekas]], [[Patti Smith]] and images of [[Robert Mapplethorpe]] installations. "A mathematical analysis of [[Marcel Duchamp]]'s ''[[The Bride Stripped Bare By Her Bachelors, Even|The Large Glass]]'', expressed in terms of [[Kurt Weill]] and [[Bertolt Brecht]]'s opera ''[[Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny]]''"<ref>[http://www.getty.edu/research/scholarly_activities/events/mahagonny.html Rani Singh] ([[J. Paul Getty|Getty]] Research Institute). See also Rani Singh's [http://www.harrysmitharchives.com/4_news/mahagonny.html statement] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20061108030825/http://www.harrysmitharchives.com/4_news/mahagonny.html |date=November 8, 2006 }} on the accompanying symposium ''Investigating Mahagonny'' (2002). In addition see articles by [https://www.nytimes.com/2002/09/13/movies/13MAHA.html Dave Kehr] ([[The New York Times]]), [http://www.villagevoice.com/film/0237,hoberman,38185,20.html Jim Hoberman] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20051028114304/http://www.villagevoice.com/film/0237,hoberman,38185,20.html |date=October 28, 2005 }} ([[The Village Voice]]), and [http://www.kiez-ev.de/film/mahagonny Thomas Steinberg] {{Webarchive|url=https://archive.today/20120803122559/http://www.kiez-ev.de/film/mahagonny |date=August 3, 2012 }} (Kiez e.V., in German).</ref> upon which it is loosely based. Smith divided the images into four groups (Portraits, Animations, Symbols and Nature) and, with the assistance of Khem Caigan, arranged them as a series of procedural permutations in relation to the opera: every reel contains twenty-four scenes forming the palindrome PASA-PASNA-PASAP-ANSAP-ASAP-N. Note that the entire series hinges on Nature. Extended version of No. 14 (it also uses the same 1956 German language recording) Smith considered this film to be the ground-breaking harbinger of his unfinished masterwork, which was to have been an explication of the [[Eschatology|Four Last Things]].
*''No. 19'' (1980) 35&nbsp;mm widescreen ([[CinemaScope|scope]]), color, silent. Untraced excerpts from No. 13. See also No. 20.
*''No. 20: Fragments of a Faith Forgotten'' (1981) 35&nbsp;mm widescreen ([[CinemaScope|scope]]), color, silent, 27 min. Consists of No. 16 and No. 19.

==Archive==
In 2013, the [[Getty Research Institute]] announced its acquisition of the Harry Smith papers.<ref>{{cite web |title=Harry Smith Papers (Getty Research Institute) |url=http://www.getty.edu/research/special_collections/notable/harry_smith.html |website=Getty.edu |access-date=31 May 2022}}</ref> This wide-ranging archive consists of writings on film projects and ethnography, documents and photographs related to Smith's early interest in Pacific Northwest Indians as well as a complete collection of his most significant films, audiotapes, and ephemera.

Smith's original film elements are archived and preserved at [[Anthology Film Archives]] in New York City.

Among the archive there is a collection of paper airplanes that Smith found in the streets of New York. [[Jason Fulford]] in ''[[The New Yorker]]'' described this collection as "one of the oddest":
<blockquote>The "samples", as Smith called the planes, are delightfully varied. The papers are intriguing—scraps and junk mail bear the fingerprints of history, in fonts, colors, and patterns. But what reportedly attracted Smith was the variety of constructions. A friend recalled him observing that there were trends in the designs, ways of folding that would become prevalent and then disappear, only to have a resurgence years later. An airplane could also be a manifestation of its creator’s past—in addition to finding planes in the street, Smith would ask friends and visitors to show him how they used to make paper airplanes when they were children. Some of the planes are sharp and speedy-looking, while others spread out like tablecloths. There's a little yellow one that looks like a skittish moth. It’s impossible not to look at some of the designs and think: the planes I made as a kid would fly better than that. Many of the airplanes have writing on them by Smith, noting the location where they were found.<ref>{{Cite magazine|url=http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/10/05/the-paper-airplane-collector|title=The Paper Planes of New York|date=September 28, 2015|magazine=The New Yorker}}</ref></blockquote>

In 2015, [[Anthology Film Archives]] published a book about the paper airplane collection called ''Paper Airplanes: The Collections of Harry Smith: Catalogue Raisonné, Volume I''.<ref>{{cite book |title=Paper airplanes : the collections of Harry Smith |date=2015 |location=New York |isbn=978-0989531139|last1=Klacsmann |first1=John |last2=Lampert |first2=Andrew }}</ref>

==Film and video appearances==
*[[Paola Igliori|Igliori, Paola]]. ''American Magus: Harry Smith'' (2001–02). Video. Includes clips from Smith's films, drawings, paintings, rare archive footage and interviews with [[Allen Ginsberg]], [[Gregory Corso]], [[Lionel Ziprin]], [[Robert Frank]], [[Jonas Mekas]], [[John Cohen (musician)|John Cohen]], [[James Wasserman]], M. Henry Jones, [[Percy Heath]], [[Grateful Dead]], [[Patti Smith]], [[DJ Spooky]], Khem Caigan, [[Harvey Bialy]] and Rosebud Feliu-Pettet.
*[[Jonas Mekas|Mekas, Jonas]]. ''Birth of a Nation'' (1997) 16&nbsp;mm, color, 85 min. Snippets of 160 underground film people (including Smith) recorded between 1955 and 1996.
*Lund, Simon (c. 2000, 2002). [http://www.folkstreams.net/vafp/clip.php?id=5 ''Restoring Harry Smith's Mahagonny'' a.k.a. ''Making of Mahagonny''] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060512141447/http://www.folkstreams.net/vafp/clip.php?id=5 |date=May 12, 2006 }}. Short documentary on the restoration of No. 18.
*Singh, Rani (2002). ''On Mahagonny''. Video. [[Jonas Mekas]] and others discuss No. 18. Features conversation between Smith and critic [[P. Adams Sitney]] shot by [[André S. Labarthe]] in 1971.
*Singh, Rani (2006). ''The Old, Weird America: Harry Smith's Anthology of American Folk Music''. Video with [[Beck]], [[Nick Cave]], [[Elvis Costello]], [[Steve Earle]], [[Allen Ginsberg]], [[Philip Glass]], [[Emmylou Harris]], [[Percy Heath]], [[David Johansen]], [[Luis Kemnitzer]], [[Greil Marcus]], [[Bob Neuwirth]], [[Beth Orton]], [[Lou Reed]], [[Hal Willner]] and others.

==References==
{{Reflist}}

===Works cited===
{{refbegin}}
* {{cite journal |author-link=John Cohen (musician) |last=Cohen |first=John |title=A Rare Interview with Harry Smith |journal=[[Sing Out!]] |volume=4 |number=5 |year=1969 |pages=2–6}}
* {{cite news |first=Steve |last=Hochman |title=Harry Smith: Folk music's pied piper: Music his celebrated 1952 anthology will be explored during UCLA and Getty Center events |newspaper=Los Angeles Times |date=April 19, 2001 |url=https://www.proquest.com/docview/2140837478 |id={{ProQuest|2140837478}} }}
* {{cite book |editor-last=Igliori |editor-first=Paola |editor-link=Paola Igliori |year=1996 |title=American Magus Harry Smith: A Modern Alchemist |place=New York |publisher=Inanout Press |isbn=0-9625119-9-4}}
* {{cite book |editor1-last=Perchuk |editor1-first=Andrew |editor2-last=Singh |editor2-first=Rani |year=2010 |title=Harry Smith: The Avant-Garde in the American Vernacular |place=Los Angeles |publisher=[[Getty Research Institute]] |isbn=978-0-89236-735-1}}
* {{cite book |author-link=Ed Sanders |last=Sanders |first=Ed |title=Fug You: An Informal History of the Peace Eye Bookstore, the Fuck You Press, the Fugs, and Counterculture in the Lower East Side |place=Philadelphia |publisher=[[Da Capo Press]] |year=2011 |isbn=978-0-306-81943-8}}
{{refend}}

==Further reading==
{{refbegin}}
* {{cite journal |last=Cantwell |first=Robert |authorlink=Robert Cantwell |title=Smith's Memory Theater: The Folkways Anthology of American Folk Music |journal=New England Review (1990-) |volume=13 |issue=3/4 |pages=364–397 |date=1991 |jstor = 40243455 |ref=none}}
* {{cite book |editor-last=Foye |editor-first=Raymond |year=2002 |title=The Heavenly Tree Grows Downward: Selected Works by Harry Smith, Philip Taaffe, and Fred Tomaselli |place=New York |publisher=[[James Cohan Gallery]] |ref=none}}{{ISBN?}}
* {{cite book |editor-last=Singh |editor-first=Rani |year=1999 |title=Think of the Self Speaking: Harry Smith, Selected Interviews |place=Seattle |publisher=Elbow/Cityful Press |isbn=1-885089-06-6 |ref=none}} Introduction by [[Allen Ginsberg]]. Contains a much-expanded transcript of [[John Cohen (musician)|John Cohen]]'s [[Hotel Chelsea]] Interview with Smith (originally published in 1969 in ''[[Sing Out!]]'') from Cohen's original tapes.
* {{cite book |author-link=P. Adams Sitney |last=Sitney |first=P. Adams |year=1979 |title=Visionary Film: The American Avant-Garde 1943-1978 |place=New York |publisher=Oxford University Press |ref=none}}{{ISBN?}}
* {{cite book |author-link=John Szwed |last=Szwed |first=John |year=2023 |title=Cosmic Scholar: The Life and Times of Harry Smith |place=New York |publisher=[[Farrar, Straus and Giroux]] |isbn=978-0-374-28224-0 |ref=none}}
* {{cite book |last=Tippins |first=Sherill |title=Inside the Dream Palace: The Life and Times of New York's Legendary Chelsea Hotel |chapter=Mahagonny |pages=301–340 and passim |publisher=Houghton Mifflin Harcourt |year=2013 |ref=none}}{{ISBN?}}
{{refend}}

==External links==
*[http://www.harrysmitharchives.com/ Harry Smith Archives]
*[http://www.celestialmonochord.org/ The Celestial Monochord]''The Celestial Monochord: Journal of the Institute for Astrophysics and the Hillbilly Blues'']. Webzine "Dedicated to Harry Smith's Folkways anthology, early [[Old-time music|old-time]] commercial recordings, and the folk music revival."
*[http://ballofwax.org/2011/11/drew-christie-some-crazy-magic-meeting-harry-smith/ ''Some Crazy Magic: Meeting Harry Smith''. Short film animated by Drew Christie. Based on anecdote by John Cohen (narrator)], on Vimeo, reviewed by Levi Fuller, ''Big Ball of Wax Audio Quarterly'', November 24, 2011.
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20110724095645/http://khem-caigan.livejournal.com/4498.html "American Magus: Harry Smith: A Modern Alchemist".] Khem Caigan, interviewed by Paola Igliori. Excerpt from book,  ''American Magus: Harry Smith: A Modern Alchemist'', Paola Igliori, editor, (1996).
*[http://www.laweekly.com/content/printVersion/33474/ Doug Harvey, "Dismembering Harry Smith"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110629143939/http://www.laweekly.com/content/printVersion/33474/ |date=June 29, 2011 }}, [[LA Weekly|''L. A. Weekly'']], May 10, 2001.
*[http://www.furious.com/perfect/harrysmith.html Tom Paley / Peter Stampfel: "Harry Smith" Tributes"] Essays excerpted from new Liner Notes for ''The Anthology of American Folk Music''. Smithsonian Folkways, 1997 CD reissue of Smith's 1952 Folkways Anthology.
*[http://www.awn.com/mag/issue3.9/3.9pages/3.9singhsmith.html Rani Singh, "Fragments of a Faith Forgotten: Unearthing the Harry Smith Archives", ''Animation World Magazine'' 3 (December, 1998): 9].
*[http://sonicyouth.com/links/art.html Biography of Smith] from website of [[Sonic Youth]].

{{Authority control}}

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