Gemma SMITH

born 1978, Sydney, New South Wales
lives and works Brisbane, Queensland

Gemma Smith’s visual arts practice alternates between painting and sculpture. The two areas of her practice inform one another and when both areas are viewed collectively, there is an overriding sensation that the body of work is an evolving, inter-woven system arising from the kaleidoscope interplay of form and colour.

This collection of colourful geometric works with their rhythmic sequence of colours and shapes demand active observation from the viewer, almost instructing this activity and making us conscious of the physical act of looking itself.

Smith’s paintings are concentrated in colour and lively with movement of angles and edges. These are remarkably compact and sophisticated studies of colour and momentum. Displayed in a line, they punctured the wall like stain glassed windows of complex geometry. Although small in scale, these works play a key role in Smith’s overall practice which jumps between two and three dimensional artwork and allow her to trial visual strategies before progressing to larger-scale works.

An ongoing aspect of her practice since 2003, these paintings initially take their composition from abstract drawings that resemble dense crystalline structures and rock formations. More recently, the artist has omitted these under-drawings and allowed the paintings to evolve intuitively, section by section.

With an approach to painting which reflects geometry and mathematics there could be a tendency to accumulate parameters or rules. Smith, however, routinely changes paint types and surfaces in an effort to avoid formulaic methods. She also looks to other media to further investigate spatial depth and movement within her paintings. Hand in hand with the small paintings, the artist created a series of three dimensional sculptural works titled Boulders.

Described as three dimensional versions of her paintings, these multifaceted structures reference the symmetry of crystals or gem stones. Smith constructs the Boulder’s sculptural forms from coloured acrylic plastic.

The structure begins as a single facet cut from coloured transparent acrylic. Additional facets are individually measured to fit with its predecessors, cut in sequence and joined together to close the three dimensional form. As the viewer peers through the Boulder’s transparent form, the coloured acrylic panels overlap revealing new perspectives as additional shapes and colours appear.

This body of paintings and sculptural works embodies the essence of the artist’s practice; that is, the paintings affirm the serial possibilities of Smith’s practice and the sculpture activate the vibrant movement of this concept into three dimension form.

Other selected artwork acquisitions