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Biography
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| I
studied painting at Camberwell (74/78) and the Slade (78/80)
and won a Boise Scholarship in 1980 to travel in America.
In 1993 I won the Guinness
Award for the best first time exhibitor at the Royal Academy
Summer Exhibition.
While
I lived in London my work was abstract, based on urban landscape,
but since moving to the West Country in 1989 my work has
been mainly figurative and based on observation. At first
I concentrated on still life and interiors in watercolour
and oil, but more recently my focus has shifted towards
painting City environments again, and the people who pass
through them. Etching is also an important part of my work,
both still life and architectural subject matter, mainly
based on New York.
SOLO EXHIBITIONS |
| 2006 |
"Destination Unknown", Artmill Gallery, Plymouth,
Devon |
| 2005 |
"Thresholds", Artmill Gallery, Plymouth, Devon |
| 2003
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The Townmill Gallery, Lyme Regis, Dorset |
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2003 |
"Time for Tea", accompanying the teapot collection from The
Norwich Castle Museum, TheThelma Hulbert Gallery, Honiton,
Devon |
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1999 |
The Chapel Gallery, Saltram House, Devon |
|
1995 |
Plymouth Arts Centre, Devon |
|
1990 |
The New Street Gallery, Plymouth, Devon |
|
1984 |
University of Surrey Gallery, Guildford |
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SELECTED GROUP
EXHIBITIONS
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| 2006 |
The South West Academy Open Exhibition,
Cube 3 Gallery, Plymouth, Devon |
| 2002 to 06 |
Mixed Exhibitions at Artmill Gallery,
Plymouth |
| 2006 |
The Drawn to the Valley Open Exhibition,
Cube 3 Gallery, Plymouth, Devon |
| 2003 to 06 |
The 21 Group, The Ariel Gallery,
Totnes, Devon |
| 2003 to 05 |
S.W. Open, Plymouth Society of
Artists, Plymouth Museum & Art Gallery |
| 2003 to 05 |
5th International Minature Print
Exhibition, touring venues in Scotland and throughout England |
| 2004 |
Open Print Exhibition, Royal West
of England Academy, Bristol |
| 2004 |
Summer Prints, The Ropewalk Gallery,
Barton-on-Humber, North Lincoinshire |
| 2004 |
The 21 Group, The Sherwell Centre,
Plymouth, Devon |
| 2001 to 05 |
The
South West Academy Open Exhibition, The Phoenix Art Centre
& Royal Albert Memorial Museum & Galleries, Exeter |
| 2003,98,97,93
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The
Royal Academy of Art Summer Exhibition, London
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2000,98,97,95 |
The Singer and Friedlander/Sunday Times Exhibition & Competition,
The Mall Gallery, London, Manchester, Leeds & Birmingham
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2000 |
"On Reflection", The Thelma Hulbert Gallery, Honiton, Devon
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| 1999
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"Couples", Plymouth City Museum & Art Gallery |
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1999 |
"Towards Purity", The New Ashgate Gallery, Farnham, Surrey
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1997 |
"The Guinness Award for the Best First Time Exhibitor1991-1996",
Friends Room, The Royal Academy Art, of London |
| 1996
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"A
Winter Collection", Gallery 27, Cork Street, London
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1988 |
The London Group Exhibition, The Royal College of Art, London
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| 1987
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"South East, North West", Four Artists, The Grundy Art Gallery,
Blackpool |
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1985 |
The International Contemporary Art Fair, Olympia, London
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1983 |
"53-83"
Three Decades of Artists From ILEA Schools of Art", Royal
Academy of Art, London |
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1981- 83 |
Various mixed exhibitions at the Gillian Jason Gallery, London
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1980,78 |
Stowells Trophy Award Exhibition, The Royal Academy of Art,
London |
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1978 |
Drawings from ILEA Schools of Art , The Whitechapel Gallery,
London |
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1978 |
Winsor and Newton Award Finalist, The Air Gallery and The
Royal College of Art |
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Work is in the collections of The National Trust; Guinness
plc; University College, London, University of Surrey; private
and corporate collections in Great Britain, Germany & America.
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THE VIEW WITHIN - THE PAINTINGS
OF RITA SMITH
by Jenny Pery for Devon Life, October 2004
Half-open doors and windows, mirrored reflections of rooms,
bottles,baskets, crockery, plants and clothes - these are
the objects that furnish the intensely-worked paintings
of Rita Smith. She presents a private, silent world where
even the most insignificant objects - door-knobs, floor
tiles, skirting boards - take their part like actors on
a stage. It is a feminine world of domestic bric-a-brac
where the tactile qualities of ceramic, wood and fabric
are keenly felt. With her celebration of past artefacts
she creates a mood of nostalgia for the peaceful times that
have gone.
From a very young age Rita Smith Drew and
painted, and her earliest childhood memories are of playing
with the coloured fabrics that her mother, a tailoress,
worked with at home. Rita's natural artistic talent gave
her 'cachet' at school and acted as a sort of survival kit
for coping with various severe difficulties in her early
life in South London. Despite interruptions, she pursued
her studies at Camberwell College of Art and at the Slade,
and eventually emerged gloriously with a first class degree,
many art prizes, and a traveling scholarship to America.
The American adventure was seminal; it was the first time
she had been abroad on her own, and it gave her confidence
- the confidence to live her own life as a painter while
supporting herself by teaching. Until 1992 this was her
life, painting and exhibiting the large abstract oils for
which she was gaining a reputation, and teaching art in
London and later Falmouth.
When she moved to the Devon-Cornwall border
with her present partner, the painter Peter Archer, Rita
Smith's work changed. She found she did not have the room
to work on a large scale in her house in Albaston, besides
which her earlier urban subject-matter seemed irrelevant.
She wanted to paint things around her that were relevant
to her new life - what she saw on the kitchen table. She
began experimenting with watercolour to work out compositional
problems, and discovered exciting new possibilities within
it. It did not however, make painting any easier. The lengthy,
laborious process of working in front of the motif and
looking at it very hard often makes her feel trapped, chained
to her subject, contained by it. This feeling of 'containment'
can be sensed in all her work, revolving as it does around
the relationship to those objects.
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