Released in 1975, Smith’s first recording, Horses, was inducted into the National Recording Registry at the Library of Congress in 2010 by the National Recording Preservation Board. Her subsequent albums include Radio Ethiopia; Easter, which included “Because the Night,” cowritten with Bruce Springsteen; Wave; Dream of Life, which included “People Have the Power,” cowritten with her late husband, Fred Sonic Smith; Gone Again; Peace and Noise; Gung Ho; Trampin’; Land; Twelve; Banga; and Outside Society. She is a four-time Grammy nominee and a Golden Globe nominee for the song “Mercy Is,” cowritten with Lenny Kaye for the film Noah. Steven Sebring’s 2008 documentary, Patti Smith: Dream of Life, received an Emmy nomination.

Patti Smith was awarded the prestigious 2010 National Book Award for her bestselling memoir Just Kids, chronicling her deep friendship with photographer Robert Mapplethorpe and the evolution of their work. Her other books include Witt, Babel, Woolgathering, The Coral Sea, Auguries of Innocence, Collected Lyrics, M Train, Devotion, and Year of the Monkey.

Smith holds the honor of Commandeur des Arts et des Lettres from the French Ministry of Culture. In 2007 she was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. She was honored by ASCAP with a Founders Award in 2010, representing lifetime achievement, and was a 2011 recipient of Sweden’s Polar Music Prize, an international acknowledgment of significant achievements in music. In 2013, Smith received the Katharine Hepburn Medal from Bryn Mawr College, recognizing women whose contributions embody the drive and work ethic of the celebrated actress. In 2014, the Barnard College Board of Trustees presented Smith with its Medal of Distinction. In 2016, she was awarded the Edmund Burke Medal for Outstanding Contribution to the Arts at Trinity College, Dublin.

Smith’s photographs, drawings, and installations have been exhibited in galleries and museums worldwide. Coupled with her photography exhibition, Higher Learning, Smith received a laurea magistrale ad honorem from the University of Parma and an honorary doctorate in Euro-American Literature from the University of Padua. She was awarded the Austrian Decoration for Science and Art in 2019. Smith received the PEN Literary Service Award in 2020 and an honorary doctorate from Columbia University in 2022.

Her renowned band includes guitarist and author Lenny Kaye, with whom she has collaborated since 1971; drummer Jay Dee Daugherty, since 1975; Tony Shanahan on bass and keyboards, since 1996; and her son, guitarist Jackson Smith, for over a decade.

At present Smith writes and performs, lending support for human-rights issues and environmental groups. She is primarily involved with Pathway to Paris, a nonprofit organization cofounded by her daughter, Jesse Paris Smith, offering tangible solutions for combating global climate change.  She lives in New York.