Smith celebration will honour B.C.’s ‘best-loved artist’
Well-known painter, sculptor, teacher to be feted by B.C.’s leading figures in arts and culture
Gordon Smith, known as B.C.’s “best loved artist,” is being honoured Friday at a special dinner celebrating his contribution to the visual arts community.
Smith, now in his 100th year, will be honoured by a number of B.C.’s leading figures in arts and culture including artist and writer Douglas Coupland and artist Ian Wallace. Also in attendance will be Ian Thom, former historical curator at the Vancouver Art Gallery and author of Gordon Smith: The Act of Painting.
The event at the University of B.C. includes a six-minute dance performance choreographed and danced by Alexis Fletcher of Ballet B.C. to a backdrop of Smith’s paintings on floor-to-ceiling screens. Dinner guests will see a 14-minute documentary about Smith’s life.
All funds raised go to the Gordon and Marion Smith Foundation for Young Artists Endowment Fund, which supports Artists for Kids and the Gordon Smith Gallery of Canadian Art.
The Gordon Smith Gallery on Lonsdale Avenue in North Vancouver is the only gallery in the country dedicated to young audiences.
In addition to being an artist, Smith was a revered teacher for many years. He taught thousands of students at elementary schools in Vancouver and at UBC.
“I loved teaching,” Smith told Postmedia News on Monday. “My most important work I did was to become a school teacher. I taught at Strathcona school, all subjects, then I taught art.
“Now we have an Artists for Kids Gallery. It’s unique in Canada.”
Organizers of To Gordon With Love will be setting up a two-way video link on Friday. It will allow Smith to watch the dinner and to greet people from the comfort of his Arthur-Erickson-designed home in West Vancouver.
Michael Audain is one of the honorary chairs for the evening along with his wife Yoshiko Karasawa.
Audain said he has been collecting Smith’s works for about 50 years.
The first one was one of Smith’s Long Beach series on paper. At the time, Audain said he couldn’t afford one of his more expensive oil paintings on canvas.
Now the couple have numerous Smiths in their three homes including their residence in Tokyo.
“In fact, if you go into our home in Tokyo, mainly what you’ll see on the wall is Gordon Smith paintings,” Audain said. “He’s staked out for himself a special niche in the Canadian art world. He has a gift for endowing the unremarkable with beauty and wonder.”
The unremarkable for Smith has recently been the undergrowth surrounding the edge of the forest and along trails. “He’s painted it with a complexity and sympathy I think is rare,” Audain said.
Audain also singled out Smiths’ commitment to teaching and his concern for ensuring children are exposed to visual art.
“That’s why I think it is fair to call him ‘our best loved artist,’ ” Audain said. “Everyone speaks about him with great admiration and affection.”