I don’t think I’ve included any African artists in this
series before now. I don’t have a title or much information for this painting
but I think there is a deep psychological element to it. The subject has
incredibly sad eyes and there is hurt and pain behind them. I do know that the
artist quotes Francis Bacon, Andy Warhol and Lucian Freud as his favourites. I
think the use of impasto (heavy layering of paint with palette knife or brush)
can be seen here and that’s evident in the work Francis Bacon and particularly
Lucian Freud. You can clearly see the brush-marks the artist has made and that’s
something I like in this kind of picture. Compare it, for example, with work of
the Dutch masters where brush marks are never visible.
I found a quote about this painter and sculptor: “Each of
Lionel Smit’s works offers us an entry point into the variety and
richness that lies beneath every face we encounter, whether in life, in bronze
or in paint”. I have shown some more of his work below.
