Leon Polk Smith was born in 1906 in Indian Territory, a region that was incorporated into the United States in 1907 and called Oklahoma. One of eight children, Smith left home after high school, working laborious jobs and sending money to his parents to help support the household. In the 1930s, Smith migrated to New York City to study at Teachers College, and it was there that he became an artist. The works of Constantin Brâncuși and especially Piet Mondrian—love at first sight. Through his investigations into Modernism and Neoplasticism, Smith developed an early style that led to a gallery exhibition in 1941. Lisson Gallery now surveys his work of the 40s and 50s, decades that saw Smith’s approach to painting expand beyond the established forms that had inspired him. —Jack Sullivan