Stuart Smith

Born in 1975 in Kent, UK
Resides and works in Newcastle, AUS

Stuart Smith is a Newcastle/Mulubinba-based artist. He trained as an artist and educator, having graduated with a Master of Fine Art from the National Art School, Sydney, and a Post Graduate Certificate in Education (Art and Design 14-19) from Canterbury Christ Church University, UK. His artistic practice explores abstraction as a means of examining memory, labour, displacement, and the psychological residue embedded within landscape and architecture. Through processes of fragmentation, reconstruction, layering, scraping, rubbing, and erasure, his work investigates how histories of industry, conflict, and urban transformation become absorbed into collective identity and material space.

Earlier works drew on sourced imagery of improvised vehicles, temporary structures, and militarised forms associated with survival, migration, and conflict. More recent paintings shift toward the industrial histories, particularly coal mining, shipping, and manufacturing industries. The bodies of work remain connected through an underlying methodology of disruption, material reuse, and reconstruction, where images emerge through accumulation, deterioration, and repeated revision.

Influenced by Dada strategies of collage and material disruption, Smith incorporates discarded studio materials, found imagery, paint-stained newsprint, masking tape, and distressed surfaces, treating waste as both material and methodology. Through continual reworking, forms are partially obscured, excavated, or broken apart, allowing earlier states of the painting to remain visible beneath the surface. Architectural fragments, industrial frameworks, barricades, and unstable spatial structures appear suspended between construction and collapse, reflecting the fragmented and unstable nature of memory itself.

The paintings frequently occupy threshold spaces between interior and exterior, presence and absence, visibility and concealment. Rather than depicting recognisable places, they evoke psychological terrains shaped by labour, demolition, redevelopment, and cultural change. Degraded surfaces resembling soot, ash, weathered walls, and deteriorating print matter reference the physical and emotional residue left behind by extraction industries, migration, and systems undergoing breakdown. Human presence is rarely depicted directly, yet traces of handling, erosion, occupation, and physical labour remain embedded within the surface.

Smith is interested in how abstraction can retain political and emotional charge while resisting fixed narratives or singular interpretation. Through cycles of construction and collapse, excavation and concealment, the paintings become spaces where fragments of industrial identity, working-class histories, and collective memory persist only as unstable impressions. Beneath these material processes is an atmosphere of silence, exhaustion, and suspended memory that reflects the psychological impact of industrial decline and cultural transformation.

Ultimately, the work positions landscape not as stable ground or picturesque scenery, but as a psychologically charged site shaped by accumulation, erosion, loss, and continual reconstruction — suspended between preservation and disappearance.

Stuart Smith has been exhibiting regularly in Australia for over fifteen years. Solo exhibitions include Otherwise, Excess, Wester Gallery, Newcastle (2026), In a Few Whiles, Straitjacket, Newcastle (2025), Model Society, Bird’s Gallery, Melbourne (2014). Recent group shows include Square 2, Five Walls, Melbourne (2021), Square, MaySpace, Sydney (2019); Still Life, Gallery Klei, Sydney (2016); Gyeonggi ANSAN International Art Fair, South Korea (2015); Motorclassica, Royal Exhibition Building, Melbourne (2014); and The Lab, Art Pharmacy, Sydney (2014). Smith has been a finalist in numerous awards including the EMSLA Art Award, Coffs Harbour Regional Art Gallery (2017, 2016, 2013, 2012) and Calleen Art Award, Cowra Regional Gallery (2018, 2017).

Smith has worked as an educator for the Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney; gallery assistant for Manly Art Gallery & Museum and educator for Grace Cossington Smith Art Gallery where he curated the (Re)arrangements group show.

CV:

Education:

2023-2024: Diploma of Photography and Digital Imaging, Hunter St TAFE, Newcastle AUS

2016-2018: MA in Fine Art (Painting) at National Art School, Sydney AUS

2007-2008: PGCE in Education (Art & Design 14-18) at Canterbury Christ Church University, UK

1995-1998: BA in Fine Art Painting and Printmaking at University of Bretton Hall, Leeds, UK

1994-1995: Diploma in Art and Design - Kent Institute of Art and Design, UK

Selected exhibitions:

2026 Otherwise, Excess (solo show), Wester Gallery, Newcastle, AUS

2025 In A Few Whiles (solo show), Straitjacket, Newcastle, AUS

2021 Square 2 (group show), Five Walls, Melbourne, AUS

2020 (Re)arrangements (group show), Grace Cossington Smith Gallery, Sydney, AUS

2019 Square (group show), May Space, Sydney, AUS

2019 Replay (group show), Creative Space, Sydney, AUS

2018 MFA Exhibition (group show), National Art School, Sydney, AUS

2018 Calleen Art Award (group show), Cowra Regional Gallery, AUS

2017 EMSLA Art Award (group show), Wollongong Art Gallery, AUS

2017 Calleen Art Award (group show), Cowra Regional Gallery, AUS

2016 Still Life (group show), Gallery Klei, Sydney, AUS

2016 20×20 (group show), Gallery Klei, Sydney, AUS

2016 EMSLA Art Award (group show), Coffs Harbour Art Gallery, AUS

2015 ANSAN International Art Fair (group show), Gyeonggi, SGP

2014 Creative Space Studio Artists (group show), Sydney, AUS

2014 Motorclassica (group show), Melbourne, AUS

2014 The Lab (group show), Art Pharmacy, Sydney, AUS

2014 Model Society (solo show), Bird’s Gallery, Melbourne, AUS

2014 Albany Art Prize (group show), Albany, AUS

2013 Nouvelle (group show), Bird’s Gallery, Melbourne, AUS

2013 One to One (group show), Hong Kong, HKG

2013 Sedate/Stimulate (group show), aMBUSH Gallery, Sydney, AUS

2013 Storytellers (group show), Frances Keevil Gallery, Sydney, AUS

2013 Selected Works (group show), Milk Factory Gallery, Bowral, AUS

2013 EMSLA Art Award (group show), Coffs Harbour Art Gallery, AUS

2012 Art Concerning Environment (group show), Scope Galleries, Warrnambool, AUS

2012 Selected Works (group show), Milk Factory Gallery, Bowral, AUS

2012 Selected Works (group show), Hat Hill Gallery, Blue Mountains, AUS

2012 EMSLA Art Award (group show), Coffs Harbour Art Gallery, AUS

2012 Camberwell Rotary Art Prize (group show), Melbourne, AUS

2011 Selected Works (group show), Milk Factory Gallery, Bowral, AUS

2011 Selected Works (group show), Hat Hill Gallery, Blue Mountains, AUS

2011 National Trust Harper’s Mansion Art Prize (group show), Sydney, AUS

2011 Mosman Art Prize (group show), Sydney, AUS

2006 Selected Works (group show), Royall Fine Art, Tunbridge Wells, UK

2006 Selected Works (group show), Liberty Gallery, Kings Hill, UK

2005 Selected Works (group show), Omell Galleries, London, UK

2005 Selected Works (group show), Royall Fine Art, Tunbridge Wells, UK

2004 Selected Works (group show), Omell Galleries, London, UK

2004 Still Life Still Lives (group show), Rex Irwin Gallery, Sydney, AUS

2004 Selected Works (group show), Royall Fine Art, Tunbridge Wells, UK

1999 Aphrodisia (group show), Rainmaker Gallery, Manchester, UK

1998 BA Graduate Show, Bretton Hall, Leeds, UK