Title: Scattered Stare, 2013
Medium: Oil on Canvas
Date: 2013
Unframed: 230cm x 170cm
Smit has international recognition for his expressive contemporary portraiture. For these distinctive portraits he makes use of anonymous models from the Cape Malay community. On the artist’s website he justified this choice by stating that “these women epitomize a hybrid identity within the South African context and reflects the disintegrating construction of identity within our increasingly globalized world. He also explained his style of painting as “representing a dialogue between the figurative and expressive abstract” (Loneliest 2021:1).
Smit’s paintings and sculptures are often monumental with larger-than-life figurative representations. He explained this choice as enabling the viewer to become immersed within the abstracted painting or sculpture for maximum emotional impact.
