The sculptor behind Jimi

The Jimi Hendrix statue on Broadway Avenue and East Pine Street is usually a sign of good things to come. These things may be wonderful records at Everyday Music, a delicious Thai meal farther up Broadway or one's proximity to campus—which usually leads to either a toasty classroom or a warm dorm room.


Whatever the association, it's undeniable that the Jimi Hendrix statue is one of Seattle's most famous landmarks.


Sculptor Daryl Smith is the man behind the icon.

The Seattle artist cast the statue in 1997 to be part of "The Legends Collection," a series of sculptures of musicians commissioned by Michael Malone, former chairman and CEO of AEI Music, a company that creates audio and visual branding for advertising purposes.

A sculptor that mainly worked with bronze and stone, Smith cast his pieces using a method based on the renaissance "lost wax" technique.


The technique entails the creation of several versions of the piece. The first step is to create a full-scale model out of wax. A layer of clay is then laid over the wax and the piece is fired, melting the wax and leaving hollow molds. Molten metal is then poured into the molds and allowed to cool, creating the various pieces of the statue.


Smith had a studio in The Fremont Foundry when Malone contacted him. Malone was looking to commission the statues from a local artist, and Smith says there were very few who could work with bronze.


The offices of AEI (now DMX Music) are in the building on the northeast corner of Broadway Avenue and East Pine Street, and Smith says that, despite Malone's retirement, the other statues he created—of John Lennon, Buddy Holly and more—are likely still in the building.


A lot of research went into the making of the Jimi Hendrix statue. Hendrix's pose was one pictured in a famous photograph from the Monterey Pop Festival in 1967—the performance where Hendrix famously lit his guitar on fire.


Smith spent a lot of time on the statue's smaller details as well, such as the arrangement of Hendrix's guitar strings. Hendrix was left-handed, but played a right-handed guitar stringed backwards for left-handed playing. To accurately portray this musical quirk, Smith re-stringed the right-handed guitar used in the mold, so that the sizes of the strings would match up.


"It's a small detail, I suppose," Smith says, "but it's interesting."


Smith began sculpting at a young age but did not always intend to make a career of it.

He began his college career at University of California, San Diego with the intention of transferring to University of California, Berkeley to study architecture. 
Smith says that he was inspired by his art professors in San Diego to stay to pursue sculpture, eventually achieving degrees in visual art and art history and criticism.


Smith was successful as a sculptor. He has many public pieces in the Seattle area, including the veterans' memorial on Bainbridge and the Sadako sculpture in Seattle Peace Park, but he began to rethink his career path in the early 2000s.


Commissions began to slow down in 2000 because of a financial crunch.

"It scared a lot of clients," Smith says, "A lot of artists kind of got starved out of the business."


As a result, Smith retired from sculpting in 2001 and says he hasn't put a hand to it in about five years.


"I don't even know if The [Fremont] Foundry is there anymore," he says.

Smith still lives in the Seattle area and now works in public safety at Harborview Medical Center.

Although he has retired from sculpting, Smith now "sculpts" as a mechanic by rebuilding old cars and motorcycles as a hobby.


"I'm really into rebuilding old vehicles," Smith says, "especially ones that some would consider trash."


He might not work with bronze and stone as he used to, but his interest in art is still manifest in that hobby.


"It is an art form, in its own way," he says.