Michael Smither

Born in New Plymouth, in 1939, Michael Smither has produced a vast and varied body of work, translating his intimate observations of his local environments, family and friends, and objects of the everyday into works of art. His artworks have come to sit alongside our notion of identity as New Zealanders, and cemented his position as one of this country’s leading exponents of the realist style.

Throughout his career, Smither has explored diverse creative avenues such as painting, printmaking, sculpture and music. As a composer and pianist, he developed a unique understanding of the correlation between the world of colour and the world of sound. This led to the development of his own visual harmonic chart, which formed the basis of a series of abstract paintings.

- ARTIS Gallery