Judith Gebhard Smith
Judith Gebhard Smith holds a B.A. in Art History (University of Pittsburgh) and a B.Sc.(as a graduate degree – University of Toronto) in Art as Applied to Medicine. She spent eight years as the medical illustrator for McGill University, Faculty of Medicine in Montreal, Quebec, Canada before moving to Olympia, WA in 1972. In juried competition in pastel, she has been accepted into more than 50 national and international exhibits and has received 32 awards. She holds signature memberships in three national art societies as well as "distinguished pastellist" status in the Northwest Pastel Society. Recently she has obtained juried membership in the Society of Animal Artists, New York.
"Energy and mystery are the most important components of my painting style. Whether painting ravens, crows, and other creatures in the studio, or engaged in plein air compositions, I am concerned with conveying a mood, and a sense of movement beneath the surface…an obvious or a latent energy. I seek to call attention to the mysterious components of our connection to the environment. Often I use bird images as a metaphor for human behavior.
On Cawnversations
"Cawnversations"...something many of us have been missing these past months due to the pandemic. One benefit of this isolation has been the extra time spent in the studio, a period of reflection and experimentation for me.
I had long anticipated a time when I could abandon myself to slinging acrylic paint around in a totally abstract fashion. I began with paper as a substrate and then advanced to canvas. Last spring, when Jonathan informed me that my work would be included in the September show, I began looking around my studio to see what might spark inspiration.
I was perusing my old sketch books filled with crow and raven sketches and mused how I might marry them to some of my experimental abstract images on paper. I had also become interested in trying collage, a mode I had heretofore not used in my work, other than in encaustic pieces. I began tearing or cutting out the bird drawings, and mounting them with the small abstract paintings, onto gallery-wrapped canvases. I added some other bits, extended some lines, and used inked rectangles to hold the imagery together. This created a "conversation" between the old and the new, that pleased my eye. The completely abstract images are a result of trying new palettes and tools. At one point, in the large painting, I used everything at hand, - acrylic paints, inks, cold wax, pastel, graphite, and scratching tools...a joyfully creative experience for me.
I hope you will get as much pleasure from viewing these pictures, as I have had, in creating them...
"Energy and mystery are the most important components of my painting style. Whether painting ravens, crows, and other creatures in the studio, or engaged in plein air compositions, I am concerned with conveying a mood, and a sense of movement beneath the surface…an obvious or a latent energy. I seek to call attention to the mysterious components of our connection to the environment. Often I use bird images as a metaphor for human behavior.
On Cawnversations
"Cawnversations"...something many of us have been missing these past months due to the pandemic. One benefit of this isolation has been the extra time spent in the studio, a period of reflection and experimentation for me.
I had long anticipated a time when I could abandon myself to slinging acrylic paint around in a totally abstract fashion. I began with paper as a substrate and then advanced to canvas. Last spring, when Jonathan informed me that my work would be included in the September show, I began looking around my studio to see what might spark inspiration.
I was perusing my old sketch books filled with crow and raven sketches and mused how I might marry them to some of my experimental abstract images on paper. I had also become interested in trying collage, a mode I had heretofore not used in my work, other than in encaustic pieces. I began tearing or cutting out the bird drawings, and mounting them with the small abstract paintings, onto gallery-wrapped canvases. I added some other bits, extended some lines, and used inked rectangles to hold the imagery together. This created a "conversation" between the old and the new, that pleased my eye. The completely abstract images are a result of trying new palettes and tools. At one point, in the large painting, I used everything at hand, - acrylic paints, inks, cold wax, pastel, graphite, and scratching tools...a joyfully creative experience for me.
I hope you will get as much pleasure from viewing these pictures, as I have had, in creating them...
