AustLit

Artist: Gemma Smith

Birth date, place: 1978, Sydney, Australia

Gemma Smith art training began in her hometown Sydney where she studied Bachelor of Visual Arts, Painting Studio at Sydney College of the Arts, University of Sydney in 1999. Smith went on to complete an honours degree on Bachelor of Visual Arts at Queensland University of Technology in Brisbane in 2004. She then chose to specilise in Colour theory which she did a short course at the Parson’s School of Design in New York during the summer of 2005.

2006 marked many of her major solo exhibitions at Sarah Cottier Gallery in Sydney, NSW. Her sculpture Adaptable (lemon/turquoise) 2006 showed her interest in the dynamics between colours and the geometric shape on surface and how that can change as the adaptable nature of the work creates infinite possibilities and according Smith she sees these sculpture as an inside out painting that almost backwards (Artcine) and that gives her incentive to combine the sculptural form to a flat surface. Gemma Smith proceeded to create her famous works of hardedge paintings with composition of bold colours and geometric abstractions.

In 2010 Gemma Smith explores a different form of abstractions in her paintings with softer and more spontaneous brushstrokes on flat surface forming swirl of colours. The signature palatte of bold colours and the exploration of spatial depth still remain on her work such as Suddenly in 2010.

Smith’s work was exhibited all over Australia including the Museum of Contemporary Art in Sydney, Queensland Art Gallery and Gallery of Modern Art in Brisbane Queensland, Melbourne Art Fair and also Turner Gallery in Western Australia.

The artist has relocated to Pittsburgh, United States in 2012 and converted to ‘Tangle’ paintings composed by lines that weave and interlocking to form abstractions of the city skyline. Smith continues her close relationship with Australian art community represented by the Milani Gallery in Brisbane and Sarah Cottier Gallery in Sydney.

2006 Adaptable (versatile sculpture creating different shapes exploring the

possibilities)

2008 Developed paintings with the influence of cubism and 3D sculpture with glass

surface

Exploring and accompanying the 2D artworks in the sense of shape and

shadow

2010 Initiating tangled paintings, a departure from precious works/ ambiguous thick

line forming patches of colours

2011 More sophisticated lines forming knots and tangles with clashes of different

colours

2013 Clean composition of lines tangled on white surface

“I actually feel that within the history of abstraction there is a lot of room to play.”

-Gemma Smith

Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney

http://www.artgallery.nsw.gov.au/

Museum of Contemporary Art Australia

http://www.mca.com.au/collection/artist/smith-gemma/

Milani Gallery, Brisbane

http://www.milanigallery.com.au/

Sarah Cottier Gallery, NSW

http://www.sarahcottiergallery.com

Turner Galleries, Perth, WA

http://www.turnergalleries.com.au/