Artist Statement

A successful work of art should speak from the heart it should communicate to those who view it. It should establish a mental connection between the subject and observer. It should demand a response: it should set into motion an aura as it activates memories while transporting us to where we’ve been or desire to go. This is my goal; to be able to capture and evoke that same response within my paintings that I obtained from my subject. For fifty years or more art has been my way of communicating. I have strived to make an emotional connection with the viewer not by rendering an exact likeness of my subject but by artistically reacting to what I seem and how I feel. The emphases are on ambiance, movement and emotion. I call this approach to painting “Painting in Response”.

The bulk of my latest works are scenes of Essex County. These vistas are of places and things that we often see and hurriedly pass by taken little notice. Unfortunately, we take our beautiful surroundings for granted. I love how the flatness of Essex County allows the eye to flow from one amazing scene, to another. Bountiful crops become bands of stunning colour that stretch out and like stair steps that place you in the centre of immense dramatic skyscrapes.

Throughout my life, my desire is not in creating a new approach to painting but rather; approach life as something worth painting. There’s something worth painting in everything we see and what we see there’s so much more to be revealed. Hopefully, the subject matter or expression, in which the work is conveyed, sparks a recollection or interaction between the artwork and the viewer. It is then that I have not just painted a picture, more importantly, I have made a friend.

(By Dennis K. Smith)