Philip Smith is an acclaimed visual artist from Miami where he was born and currently resides. Philip’s work has been widely exhibited in the US and abroad, including in the Whitney and Beijing Biennials, and he is represented in permanent collections of the Whitney, Museum of Fine Arts Dallas, the Perez Art Museum, among many others.

Philip also served for a short while as Managing Editor for GQ Magazine in New York where he hobnobbed with the glitterati. He wrote an exquisite memoir, “Walking Through Walls,” published by Simon and Schuster. It details his extraordinary childhood growing up with a curious and eccentric father who discovers that he can talk to the dead and heal people. His memoir is currently under development for a weekly tv series.

Why I had to carve out a mundane public identity. What happens to you when your parents lead a madcap life. How my Dad introduced me to spirit communication. How I choose my intention as an artist in these very troubled times.

www.philipsmithart.com

I remember many years ago when I was in New York and I was at a party for an artist, and people look like artists and I look like me. You know, someone for a ride out of Brooks Brothers, someone came up to me and said, Are you an accountant? I said, No. And then over in sort of in the middle of room was this woman wearing a very wild crazy outfit. I said, that's actually the artists accountant.

Hey, this is Achim Nowak, executive coach and host of the MY FOURTH ACT podcast. If life is a five act play, how will you spend your FOURTH ACT I have conversations with exceptional humans who have created bold and unexpected fourth acts, listen, and to be inspired. And please rate us and subscribe on whatever platform you are listening on. Let's get started. I am just delighted to welcome Philip Smith to the MY FOURTH ACT podcast. Philip is a visual artist from Miami where he was born and currently resides. His work has been widely exhibited in the US and abroad, including the Whitney and Beijing generals. And he is represented in permanent collections at the Whitney Museum, the fine arts Dallas Museum, the Paris Art Museum, among many others. He also served for a while as the managing editor of GQ magazine, Philip wrote an exquisite memoir published by Simon and Schuster called walking through walls, which details his experience growing up with a father who discovers that he can talk to the dead and heal the sick. I have loved this book. And I don't mean to label your childhood, but it's an extraordinary one and different from from many others. So welcome, Philip.

I'm delighted to be here.

Cool. For people who haven't read the book you had both your mom and dad come across as exceptional beings. And I had a sense you had this madcap childhood. And then at some point, it changed because your dad's interests changed. But if you give us a snapshot, what was life like for you with mom and dad, but before dad started to explore other things?

Yeah, my both my parents had moved from New York to Miami. They were fairly sophisticated people. They were members of the Museum of Modern Art. They, they went to concerts in New York. And they came to Miami in the early 50s, which basically, segregation was in full force. It was a really deep southern town. But life was idyllic. Because we lived, we had a certain amount of land. And it was a lot of wildlife. And my parents were free to reinvent themselves in a way. And that was both an example and a blessing.

Yeah. Your father, you said so jokingly, was probably the only heterosexual interior designer in all of Miami. And he had a thriving practice in Miami and throughout the Caribbean, since you are a creative spirit, and that's also a creative way of making a living. What was it like to have a dad who designed beautiful spaces?

Well, it was it was sort of glamorous, because, you know, he was working for the President of Cuba. He designed or decorated the presidential palace in Haiti. He worked for Walt Disney Dean Martin. And they were sort of jet CETI. I mean, we would we would take a run a plane down to the Bahamas for lunch or dinner. There was always something new happening, someone new coming in the office, there was always a new commission going on. And my father was a very curious person, very creative. So he just invented things as he went along. At some point, my parents decided they wanted a guest house on the property. And I remember my father taking out a garden hose and outlining the footprint of the house with the garden hose and said, there's the house. And he figured it all out based on that now, that's someone who didn't go to architecture school who didn't have an engineering degree who didn't really have a formal education.

How just given you a description right now, I'm curious since you've had a and have distinguished career as an artist. To what degree did your dad or that part of your dad, feed you? Nourish you inspire you? How connected are you to that part of your father?

I don't think I think we're twins at birth, I don't think, as he said to me through through a medium that I spoke to him a few years ago, he said, you have my DNA. And so I think that I embody both my parents, but very, very strongly, many kids are not like their parents, I am my parents. Yeah. And a little bit me in there as well,

what a beautiful statement. One of the things that struck me about reading your exquisite recollections of childhood growing up in having too, too big personalities as parents. And I want to frame it this way, because there's a lot of pressure for all of us, our listeners that we can feel or accept to fit in, in certain ways. And that pressure can exist at all stages of life. My sense was that from a young age, you knew that, gosh, my family is really different. And that maybe you couldn't let everybody know that I come from a very different family. How did you navigate the pressures to conform, and then having this rather eclectically wonderful household that you lived in?

I think it was sort of a schizophrenic approach, with the idea that this is how I needed to survive. The kids I went to school with, were kind of just regular kids, their father sold insurance, they worked for the telephone company, they own gas stations. Even before my father became this incredible, remarkable, miraculous healer, I knew that we were different. Our houses look different, we live differently. So I went to school, and I learned how to manufacture this normal presentation of myself, which has lasted pretty much all my life. I remember many years ago, when I was in New York, and I was at a party for an artist. And people look like artists. And I look like me. You know, someone for a ride out of Brooks Brothers, someone came up to me and said, Are you an accountant? I said, No. And then over in, sort of in the middle room was this woman wearing a very wild crazy outfit. I said, that's actually the artists accountant. And I also spent 25 years in a Japanese Dojo training in the martial arts. And I think that there's something about, I often disparaged myself for having these two cells. But I like the fact that I have an outer presentation that kind of glides very smoothly through the world. And then there's the inner self that's wildly creative, and imaginative and curious.

Yeah. What I was thinking about as you're talking to Philip is the real difference is inside, of course, and is the inside stuff and their levels of difference. I'm curious, because you're, you had these exceptional parents, I want to talk about your dad in a moment. Sometimes we can fully embrace who they are. And you know, many children run away from what mom and dad want to be everything but what that is. How did that play out for you?

Well, I did the same thing I was wildly embarrassed by my parents didn't want to go anywhere. I didn't want to be sane. I thought they were completely nuts. And also my father was older. I think he had me around age 50. So if we have to go anywhere, it was like I was with my grandfather. And that, of course, was all incorrect thinking I was incredibly fortunate to have these people and in many ways, I wish I had known that then. But it's amazing as much as I fought internally and sometimes externally with them. I did embody their ethos and their creativity and their visions.

Yeah. You know, many of our listeners would be venture are in their own ways. Exploring spirituality, other ways of feeling more deeply connected to whatever we call it higher consciousness, God, the divine, whatever phrase works, your dad, and they found misrepresent this piece, correct. I've been personally, for decades interested in spiritualism had been involved in that world. Your dad at some point investigated spirit communication, connecting with messengers from the other side. That led to him becoming a sought after and be loved healer in Miami. When you were a teenager, and you notice that dad is pursuing other things that can trigger a lot of stuff, and a lot of people when somebody we love or no pursues other things, what was it like for you to see dad? Pursuing stuff.

My father was always weird.

It was nothing new.

He never did anything or thought, like anyone else that I have ever met in my lifetime, everything was unique, and original. So this was just him being him, I would dip my toe into it as a young man. And then I pull back and want to be a normal kid. And there was this constant dance back and forth. But it was not a shock, because he had, as he had always been interested in Eastern philosophies. And this is back in the 50s. There, there was no Oprah selling 10 CD sets about, you know, be your best self. This was not in the general culture or conversation. There were no metaphysical book departments at Barnes and Noble. It was a very different world. So this was he was unique, as usual. It just was how he was.

But my sense was that as he kept exploring, he took you along for the ride. He gave you the chance to get involved and to also explore that world. And you use the phrase, I dipped my toe into it. So I'm curious, how far did you dip your toe?

As of now or back then?

Well, back then. And by lucky to connect it to now as well,

he would take me to healings to seances. And he would teach me his use of the pendulum. And I would of course, pretend I was wildly bored. Like, really, who cares. But I learned and I paid attention. It's not something that I could go to school and tell my friends about, I couldn't say, hey, come over to the house, and let's watch my father chore cancer, that he would have gotten arrested because he did get arrested for many times for practicing medicine without a license. I was very aware, as a kid, there are certain things you say at home. And there are other things you just don't say in the outside world. That, again, is a little bit you look at maybe children of alcoholics, and they can't talk about what goes on at home. I'm not comparing myself to that in any way. But there was there was two very distinct worlds that I lived in, and still do in a way.

So since you you asked, do we talk about the past or today, if we make the leap today, so if you I may be asking a possible question. What is your connection now to spirit to spirituality to spirit communication? How does that matter in your life and work today?

It's ever present, I fully aware of the energy around me. I'm fully aware when this is a corny word, but spirit guides me, I'm fully aware of when events set themselves up in my life that are somewhat mysterious, or extraordinary, but they fall into place. I'm fully aware of my own consciousness and how I can use it. And even if I'm in the backyard, the intelligence that surrounds me from plants, I mean, I see these vines, and they reach out. They're just going out into the off a tree somewhere. But they know how to find the next tree to wrap themselves around. That's extraordinary intelligence in what we think are almost inanimate objects. So I'm fully aware of that. And I tried to harness it every day and use it for good for myself. I'm sort of now out of the closet about talking about this because I feel that increasingly, the culture is coming on board with this. We do need to acknowledge that we are spiritual, miraculous human beings and start acting that way instead of acting like spoiled children. And we need to make this a better world pretty quickly.

As you just mentioned, it's this much more public conversation about spirit spirit connection using it for the good. And at the same time, my sense is they can You think that can be easily commercialized. And there's nothing wrong with commercialization, trivialized, over simplified. We were talking before we recorded about your connection to donate pile where you spent some time and an ancient wisdom there, which can look different if you then sell it in a shopping mall somewhere in the suburbs. What is your hope for a larger authentic consciousness around, it's a spirit, Spirit guidance and how all of us are connected with each other. And with nature, as you so beautifully said.

We need to find a way. I wasn't raised in the church. But you know, church, church attendance is the lowest point in in American history. And the church has good and bad aspects to it. But it did guide people, it did open their hearts in a certain way. And it did set role models to be a better person, we don't have any of that anywhere. And people either lazy or don't know how to find that and develop that. And I think we do need guidance, becoming just burning some incense and chanting and then going out in the world and being a horrible person is not the answer here. And it's not it's fake, just like so much of our culture is. A lot of times, I've had personal examples where people are supposedly very spiritual yoga teachers, and they're just really damaged, awful people. It's something we need to make aware of in the culture, I try and do my bit through my paintings, which in many ways are not just paintings, but they're energy factors that people can live with. I try and do it by doing shows like this and talking about my father writing books. I am not a politician. I'm not President, the United States, I can't simply put into laws that everybody's going to be spiritual. But I think that what I am not a public person, and what I can do is just in my own life, when I deal with the cashier at the supermarket or the FedEx gentleman, I can always be present and on positive. That's the little I can do every day I can help people. And I think we can all do that.

So beautifully said, Philip. I want to connect what you just said to the fact that you are an artist, you just mentioned that you've been an artist for a very long time. I'm curious coming from the firm and how through your art you can transmit energy that's helpful to the planet rather than hurtful. Given what we just talked about your parents were, were your parent, how supportive Were your parents of things that you fill up wanted to do with your life? Was that a carte blanche? Oh, if you want to be an artist, great. You want to do this ray, do whatever you want was was that what it was? Like?

Yes and no, my father was a painter and a photographer. He I have his painting still. They're pretty extraordinary. He had exhibited at the Steiglitz gallery, I think once or twice. My mother was very concerned because back in the 50s and 60s, there was no art world, there was no commercial art world paintings. Basquiat paintings weren't going for $150 million. And artists overall, aside from maybe Picasso and Matisse, were extremely impoverished and lead really difficult lives. And she was concerned. Well, I thought I should be an attorney. I probably would have been a good attorney. But it's not a choice I made. And I think after a while, she just gave up. But my father was very supportive. I think he was relieved when I did get this job at GQ because it was my first job. And they're my first steady income. And he told a friend of his I don't have to worry about Phillip anymore. So yeah, I think that they were supportive. They wanted me to be creative and follow my heart and my destiny so to speak, but they also wanted me to not be uncomfortable or impoverished.

Yeah. Which is an understandable concern that, of course, it's a parent's dog. Since you mentioned GQ, and I just want to throw out the stereotype you know, in that industry, and I was in New Yorker for a long time. The stereotype is stuff like The Devil Wears Prada, you know, and an imperious leader and very fast paced and an almost insane pace. And the person I'm talking with right now, it feels you know, calm centered, and like none of that. So I envision I'm trying to visualize you in that world? Am I overly stereotyping what that life is like with the pressures that come with it?

No. That's, let's say that's a documentary. But in my case, I was like 27 years old. And I had left Miami or college three years earlier. This for me, and I think it was different for everybody. But for me, GQ was like Alice in Wonderland. It was this whole new world. I mean, Mel Gibson would come up to the office that Jagger, I knew Andy Warhol, Armani would stop by Versace would stop by. And it was like, these are people you just read about and all sudden, here they are. It was a great sort of graduate course. In one way of living. I'm very grateful. They sent me to Australia, they sent me to India to do stories. It was I was a kid. And it was a great, great opportunity. And I'm very grateful for it. I was only there for like, two, three years. And then I left and I started painting, but it was, it was great.

Yeah. A word from your sponsor. That's me. I invite you to go to the website associated with this podcast www.my, fourth active.com, you will find other equally inspiring conversation with great humans. And you will also learn more about the my fourth act mastermind groups where cool people figure out how to chart their own fourth acts. Please check it out. And now back to the conversation. So why did you leave if I

may ask? Well, I wanted to be a painter. And I think that I knew that I had tasted what I had to taste. And I didn't want to get fat at the dinner table. And it was time to sort of move on. The other world was calling me.

Yeah, that's such a beautiful way of saying it. And in my conversations in this podcast, some of my guests are as they enter, let's say their 60s or 70s. Explore stuff that they've always wanted to explore, but never had the chance to do others. Keep doing what they're doing. But it continues to evolve and change and deepen or go sideways. And my hunch is you're in that latter rubric. I don't want to label you. So please correct me if I'm wrong. But as somebody who's had a long, prolific career as a professional artist, what do you keep learning about your work and yourself as you continue to make art.

I'm going to reverse that. It's what I learned about myself. And then the work because myself comes first. Without myself, there is no work. And I think that that's part of the problem in the contemporary art world. So many people are making work that they learned how to make in graduate school, or they want to be a star, they want to be famous, but they're not putting in the the effort or the work to explore the internal and draw from that they're really drawing from the outside. And that kind of work is very transitory if it's political work or cultural comment, it's very, very transitory. And you go back to Egypt, it's 5000 years now, after those temples were made, and there is no one that can walk through the Temple of Karnak or any of those temples and not being all. That is, it's just magnificent. And there's such a strong spirituality about the work, that I'm not saying I can do that. But that's what drives me is I want that kind of relationship to my viewer. It's not about me, I don't want to be Picasso and be the Trickster and the famous person. I want a genuine conversation and connection. But and I will add in the last couple years, I did build a new house and studio that I largely designed, and it's sort of my castle and it's given me tremendous freedom, emotional freedom and creative freedom. I have everything I need. And I think that has allowed the work to really just flourish. I'm not distracted by the New York art world by going to this gallery, that gallery, this museum show, this person did that this person just got $2 million at auction. All that's great, but it's a kind of noise and distraction. And I I feel at least in for me, being than artists means going inside, reflecting, and really being directly honest with the work you're making and with yourself. And I think that everything I've done in my life, the 25 years in the dojo, working at GQ, and having my parents has brought me to where I am now, I think I'm doing the best work I've ever done.

I want to talk about your work in a moment. But I am totally intrigued by 25 years in the dojo, because I can't imagine that, could you give us maybe a snapshot of what that might look like and feel like?

It was all encompassing. I often said to myself, I wish I could go on Social Security, and just live in the dojo. Because it I'm very grateful to my teacher, Cato, and the organization was Saito karate. Yes, you did learn self defense you learned you could, I guess, kill people. But without saying anything, if you were interested in the deeper, more spiritual aspects of the martial arts, they were there, you have to find them. You have to be aware, nothing was handed to you. But the discipline was extraordinary. People think of artists as someone who, you know, is up late at night drinking and partying and gets up and then makes this crazy work and has all these wild adventures. That didn't work. For me, I liked the discipline to get up and go in the studio. One day I was in dojo and I walked in, I was very distracted from something going on. And one of the other belts came up to me and said, when you walk in the dojo, because you you symbolically take off your outer jacket and your shoes, and you bow and you cross the floor in a certain way. By taking off your jacket, you are leaving the outside world behind, I don't care if there's a nuclear war happening outside, when you're in the dojo, you're in the dojo. That's it. And that helped me that when I went in the studio, I wasn't making phone calls. I wasn't listening to the radio, oh, I need a nap. I need coffee, I forgot to call Sylvia about lunch. I'm in the dojo, I'm in the studio. And that was incredibly helpful. And it sounds like an easy thing. But it took a lot of years to figure that out.

That was so clear. But you already mentioned earlier and you and I had a chat before we recorded about there are a lot of forces of darkness, you know, revealing themselves in the world right now there will always there. But maybe they're more more visible there in our faces. And I would imagine there's a tension between going into my world. I closed the doors. You talked already about how you serve the world in small ways. But how do you reconcile that between La because the 80s you for all of us to feel hopeless? As we look at what's going on the world? You know, like the world is going to hell like what am I going to do while I just stay in my place? I'm not saying you're saying that. But how will we reconciling the inner and the outer in how or how do you reconcile it as you navigate life?

There's a couple things. And I do wrestle with this every day because like other people, I foolishly read the news. And it's a disaster in a larger sense. And I hope I'm correct. At every level. And all around the globe, we're going through tremendous change, whether it's suddenly we're reading books, on little devices called phones, as opposed to going into the library or bookstore and buying a book, music. I haven't bought a CD and I don't know, 10 1215 years, and I used to buy them all the time. And all these changes. While they seem conveniences are really profound. And they're they're unlike anything human beings have ever seen before. So as a result, people are going to rebel or act up. It's just normal. They're just profound changes everywhere. And suddenly, people want all sorts of rights and all sorts of things. So on one hand, part of me feels that all this change, both good and bad. Change is just noise and static as we go through these changes in Evolve. Every major upheaval in human history has been accompanied by noise. On the other hand, that worries me that that's too easy and explanation and yes, there is real darkness out there. There's tremendous anger. I remember me reading a book years ago, many, many, like 30 years ago about the by the Dalai Lama and they interviewed him. And they said, What is the most dangerous thing in the world? And he said, anger, and I never understood it, but he's correct. Anger is this very toxic dark emotion that that is like a cancer that spreads. So part of me has to do my work. And I can't, I can't worry about who's the president or who said what in politics. So I do my work. On the other hand, as we mentioned yesterday, this is our world. It's not the President's world. It's not Vladimir Putin, it's our world. And all of this, in very small ways, can move the world forward. And I think that is our responsibility. I'm not saying that we all have to go volunteer at soup kitchen. So we all have to go demonstrate, or we all have to, you know, fish garbage out of the bay, which would be great. But I think in our daily lives, we can move forward, we can be more tolerant as we drive, we can be more tolerant in the grocery store. I'll tell you one little story. Many years ago, when I lived in New York, it was one of those horrifically cold nights. I mean, it must have been below zeros just. And I had no food in the apartment. So I went out, and I got some Chinese food I was going to bring back and there was a homeless guy that sort of lived on the corner. Mr. Williams is his name, or was his name, I don't know. And I had bought a big container of hot soup as part of my meal. And this guy's living out on the street. I mean, it's just unbearable. And I just took out the soup. And I handed it to him. I said, Mr. Williams, you might need this. And I've walked home. Behind me, someone came running up to me. And he said, Oh, man, that was so cool. What you just did, I would have never thought to do that. And I was very happy, because maybe I changed this guy's mind, maybe he will be a more compassionate, more engaged soul. And also in the dojo, we were always taught to always act like we are teaching. Because if as a black belt, we do something sloppy, or we make no mistake, the under belts are going to copy us because they're going to think we're the teacher. And we're doing it the right way. So basically, you have to be impeccable, to the best of your ability in everything you do, how you take a shower, how you answer the phone, how you prepare your meal. And I think we all have that I think we all get a little lazy and sloppy. And if we if we tighten up, if everybody would just tighten up and be a little bit more compassionate by 5% 10%, I think we would see changes in the world.

I love the word impeccable. I happen to have just before recorded, you know, looked at your latest artwork that you have out. It's exquisite. It's definitely larger than who's the president or what Mr. Putin is doing. And I have a hunch that you are impeccable with your art. It's one of your mediums if you this is a podcast and nobody can see the artwork that you're currently creating. But if you had to speak maybe about the intention of right now, given what's going on in the world, what are you intending to create with your art?

Well, first of all, I wanted to be engaging, beautiful, but more importantly, and maybe this is really naive. I'm trying to create a shift that when people look at the work, or live with the work, there's an energy shift. And a woman who's a friend came in and she bought three paintings from the exhibition. And she told me, and we really didn't talk about the work, but she told me during the day, if she gets flustered or she gets upset, she just stands in front of the work and gets an energy bath, which I thought was phenomenal. I thought, well, he is open to what the work is and be the work is doing what it's supposed to do. So I would like to have a shift. And I was I just recently got a commission for an airport down here. And we talked about another commission about a courthouse. And I said I would love to do that commission because I'd love to put the positive energy into that environment and have it there and just let it emanate. The real purpose of art is to to change people's world and world perception and whether you go to the cave drawings or even In, you know, paintings, religious paintings by the church, it was to educate. It wasn't entertainment. It wasn't just about beauty there was there was intention there. And that has been sort of bleached out of art for the last certainly in the 20th century. And it looks like still in the 21st. But there are signs that people are starting to pay attention to the more spiritual aspects.

I'd love to close with this question. You know, this is called the fourth act podcast. And some of our listeners are thinking about other things that might want to explore with their lives. And they might be listening to you and go, Gosh, that Phillips had this amazing life. So adventurous. He was lucky he had these madcap adventures, parents, you know, I'm gonna try could ever attempt some of the things that Philip did. But if you were to give some words of wisdom to somebody who has hunches, or interests or things that might want to try that they haven't tried before, what wisdom would you have with that person?

I don't know, wisdom, but I can tell them that those hunches are there for a reason. And they're real. And just because they're a thought, you know, once upon a time, electric light bulbs were a thought they didn't exist in this world. If you're having that thought, especially if it's recurrent, it's possibly coming from another dimension, or it's coming from your other selves. That's telling you, you need to do this. And I'm a big fan of doing things incrementally, because it's very hard to make huge, massive changes. I know people who've done it, suddenly gave up their work and move to another state. Good friend of mine, suddenly became a farmer. One day, he had been a very successful contractor. But just one day move by the farmhouse became a farmer. And he's super, super happy, and I'm happy for him. I think you have to listen to your heart. And that's what we have forgotten how to do.

Yeah. If any listeners are thinking, well, I want to just find out more about Phillips work. I know these days work can be accessed online. Where would you like to direct people who are curious about their will who want their own energy bath as they look at your work?

Well, the work is at Philip Smith art.com. And it's filled with one hour, because if you type in two L's we'll never get there. And then the book about my father is at walking through walls, the book.com. And by the way, I forgot to mention that. I think about 10 years ago, the book was bought by Showtime, and they optioned it for five years as a series. And we're it it just didn't happen. Like as I was told maybe one to 2% of these books that are option actually get made. But it's in the process of being optioned again. And my hope with that is different than before, that if it is on television, I want us to open people's minds and change people's minds and not just entertain them.

Beautiful. Thank you so much for the gift of this conversation, Phillip, it was just a joy to speak with you. My pleasure.

And thank you for the opportunity to share with your listeners.

Bye bye. Bye. Like what you heard, please go to my fourth act.com And subscribe to receive my updates on upcoming episodes. Please also subscribe to us on the platform of your choice. Rate us give us a review and let us all create some magical fourth acts together. Ciao