Curated from the Davis Museum collection by internationally recognized artist Kiki Smith, this gallery integrates dozens of vessels from a wide range of cultures and periods into an installation of her design. Smith also selected a single painting—a spectacular 18th-century Mexican ex-voto depicting a woman enduring a mastectomy—for a key location in the gallery.  Fragmented reproductions of the painting are dispersed throughout the installation, which she entitled Cut from Her Breast. 

Smith's presentation of these works of art is a departure from the typical aesthetics of museum display. By inviting artists to curate selections from the collection, the Davis Museum hopes to expand upon the ways in which works of art are experienced and interpreted. As museums increasingly call attention to how the display of objects encodes and constructs meaning, Smith has joined a growing number of artists sought after as curators.

Smith's artistic production engages a wide range of media from installation to sculpture, printmaking, and photography. Based in New York City since the mid-1970s, she has exhibited widely and is represented in collections throughout the world. She has organized exhibitions at the CUE Art Foundation, the International Print Center New York, the Rubin Museum of Himalayan Art, and the Carnegie Museum of Natural History.