Amy Smith

"Devilish" mixed media collage on wood with neon

2023

Amy Smith is a self-educated contemporary artist. Born in New Jersey, she moved to Los Angeles where she found inspiration, mentors, and support in the Street Art community. In her...

Amy Smith is a self-educated contemporary artist. Born in New Jersey, she moved to Los Angeles where she found inspiration, mentors, and support in the Street Art community. In her ...

This piece depicts a colorful collage composition portrait of Marilyn Monroe, as Jon Davenport explores the process of deconstructing iconic imagery from the past and present. Davenport start’s out with photos of his paint-stained studio floor and collages in articles/advertising from an array of vintage magazines collected over the years; plus any other interesting stuff captured on his travels. He then transfers the images to a panel board, layering them on with gel medium, together with strokes, splashes, drips, and splats of paint. Once it's dry, another layer of gel medium is poured on to give it a melting effect. After it drys off again, another layer of paint is added to embellish a few areas and to accentuate or fade out certain aspects. And then, he finally adds a coat of polyurethane for protection and making the colors pop. This unique work is executed on a wood panel board and comes ready to be displayed with hanging wire on verso, signed by the artist lower right. Art measures 36 x 36 in From biology student to owning and running a creative agency in London to a career as a fine artist, life has taken Jon Davenport on a rewarding and unconventional journey. Despite his scientific beginnings, he’s always had a strong artistic streak weaving its way through his different career paths. Growing up in Ipswich, UK, Jon was always an avid drawer, and could often be found with a pencil and paper in hand. With the arrival of his first computer, he embraced the new frontier of digital art and had work published in one of those early computer magazines. His creative urges took a backseat to get a biology degree at Brunel University in London. It was afterward, in his first job working at the Archant newspaper group in Ipswich, that he quickly progressed from plate maker to becoming an integral member of the art studio. It was during this time that he taught himself photoshop, desktop publishing, and graphic & web design. After a few years, he set up a design agency, and eventually went full time and moved to London. This proved to be a successful move, working for a number of clients such as Nike and Virgin, and gaining praise from the likes of Richard Branson and Tony Blair. It wasn’t until Jon moved to the USA to marry his wife, Atlanta artist Christy Kinard...

I start a lot of my pieces without any direction in mind. This is no different. While exploring a stumbled upon this and thought it resembled Patrick Nagel's art. This is why it is e...