Kurt F. Smith

I have always seen the world differently. When I look at someone or something, I see what my eyes tell me is there. Reality. Then an overlay of color and form reveals itself from the essence of the subject. My art is born of this duality of my perceptions. In whatever medium, the amalgam of the two becomes an abstraction of reality.

I strive to invoke in the viewer an alchemical moment when emotional introspection and sensual input are transmuted into self awareness through color and form.

By causing the viewer to observe reality in a way never seen, each sees something different, conjuring images from their own minds to fit the images in the art, as if recalling a dream. As with dreams, the images seen are symbols, a reflection our own inner voice.

See what you want to see; not what you think you should see.

Oils

I have gravitated towards, no, been pulled to oil paint, a connection to the old ways,
a tether to history.
The smell of the linseed oil,
the intensity of color,
under the shimmering surface,
of a freshly squeezed dollop of paint.
The feeling of metaphysical connection to the canvas through the scabs on my knuckles.
Cut, screwed, stretched, and blooded.
The purity of a blank canvas sullied by my brush.
The unparalleled sense of satiated euphoria
that results from the final stroke.

Digital

Humans are ingenious creatures.
As such, the means of conducting our society and culture results in the need for tools.
A discarded femur to a laptop is a long journey. It would be a great dishonor to the countless generations it took to bring me microchips and Photoshop, to ignore this amazing emergence of human ingenuity.