Here’s to Celebrating the Voices in Your Head:
an Explanation of Intent

Personal commentaries should read like notebooks— almost honest and out of breath, a partial view of the whole, in a sense capturing the artist’s voice for a moment. A stream of consciousness. Or a self portrait composed of words. My journals are like this, little unrealities changing radically from month to month, shifting with conflicting views and personal histories, run-on sentences and fragmented perspectives.

The intentions of my art serves mainly as a definition of myself—as an open portfolio describing who I am, or dissecting the personality in thin layers until the core is reached. But you see, already my statements are not explaining anything, they only talk at the reader, expecting the words to be harvested like fruit into baskets.

My style continually meanders through many changes and influences, among them: Medieval Illuminations, German Expressionists, French Impressionists, Frans Masereel, Frida Kahlo, Gustav Klimt, Duncan Grant, Vanessa Bell, Max Beckman, Rene Magritte, Mark Rothko, Maurice Sendak, Laurie Anderson, and Jenny Holzer. Obviously, with such a wide spectrum it remains difficult to define my artistic intentions, as necessary as these statements are.

My paintings themselves exist as a collection of voices and moods. They explore mystical concepts, like medieval texts or tarot cards. Casual scenes heighten with dream-realities and senses of color, taking a step away from waking life. In the end, a greater involvement between viewer and image is created, allowing for the creation of private myths and personal symbols for explanations and clarifications.

Bio:

David Glen Smith's painting and prose have been published in a variety of journals across the United States including such cities as Minneapolis, St. Louis, New Orleans, and Atlanta. Over the past fifteen years he served as instructor, graphic designer, editor, and illustrator. A painting completed in 1996 will be utilized as a cover design for a performance-art text book. Likewise, by mid-August, a children’s book utilizing his graphic design techniques will be available from an Atlanta-based publishing company.

Currently residing in Atlanta, Georgia he is working on a manuscript of acrylic paintings accompanied with prose. David-Glen Smith was born in Bryan, Texas. He received a MFA from Vermont College at Norwich University in Montpelier, Vermont and a MA in English/American Literature from the University of Missouri at St. Louis.