Kiki Smith shows us what the circle of life really means.

A doe, a deer, a female deer gives birth to a full grown woman...wait, what? So this sculpture obviously has nothing to do with the sweet singing von Trapp children and has a lot more to do with Kiki Smith’s fascination with the relationship between humans and animals, life and death. Especially death, Kiki grew up in a very morbid household and claimed that they were like the Addams family. This is super cool and inspiring now, but it wasn’t cool having a gravestone in your front yard growing up. But I digress. This sculpture has to do with the living side of Smith’s interests.

Kiki Smith drew her inspiration for this sculpture from two ancient legends. “One is the Germanic tale of Saint Genovefa, a queen falsely accused of infidelity and sentenced to death. She escaped, taking refuge in the forest where she and her child were sustained by a doe that nursed them both. A second figure evoked by "Born" is Saint Geneviève, a shepherd’s daughter who became the patron saint of Paris.” Saint Geneviève doesn’t really have anything to do with a doe though so we’ll just have to take her word for it.

This sculpture is made out of the classic bronze used by the Greeks and Romans thousands of years ago. But Kiki Smith uses it in a funky, fresh new way rather than adhering to the canons of yore and for that, art students are staying awake in classes across the globe!