Dustin D. Smith

BIO

Growing up in chaos, I turned to “making” as a way to control something in my life. Starting from nothing can be terrifying, but bringing things into existence brought me peace. 

I grew up in central Kansas, and at University, I was fortunate to have great art and design instructors that challenged me and nurtured my desire to create. Design took me into the agency world in Chicago in 1994, San Francisco in 2004, and simultaneously around the world for collaborations in print, film and digital production for a wide variety of clients.

As an adventurer and outdoorsman, access to the outdoors drew my family and I to Bend, Oregon in 2021. Living on the edge of the forest, near the Deschutes River, and having amazing mountain bike trails and snowboarding on Mount Bachelor has a great deal of influence on my mindset and my work. Hiking, paddling, camping and exploring fill me with ideas for more art than I can create in a lifetime.

Upon moving to Oregon, I also made a move to shift focus on my art practice. I currently divide my time between making art for myself and collectors, and select design and branding projects for startups and founders via my boutique design shop Smith & Company.

STATEMENT

Art is exploration. In my work, I explore the boundaries of permanence and impermanence via methods of pigment application and erasure, layering and erosion. An instant, a fleeting memory, a lifetime, the rise and fall of civilizations, strata of bone, stone and soil, in a seemingly infinite invisible expanse in time and space. Each a layer in the postulate of existence. As flesh and blood, I’m simply a vessel existing in a blip in time and space, transporting my consciousness via art and experience as long as I’m able. 

MY WORK

In a life that seems like the blink of an eye, I’ve experimented with a myriad of styles from realism in graphite to abstract canvases, with a range of three-dimensional mediums sprinkled throughout.

In a limited studio space, smaller works in watercolor enable me to maintain a continuous art practice without excuses. As my studio has expanded, I’ve been able to create larger abstracts, and work in multiple mediums and sizes simultaneously. 

My mental state and artwork are both heavily influenced by the world around me, as well as events of the past, present and future. These divergent themes come together in my paintings, in an attempt to explore my own journey, and evoke exploration in the mind of the viewer by creating worlds they can visit.

ART FOR SALE

Most of my work is currently for sale here on my site, or by messaging me on Instagram. I'm continually adding pieces here to my shop, and will be offering periodic print drops here as well. 

I am also generally open to commissions based on my recent work. Please contact me for more information and to initiate that process.