Donald Smith (1926 - 2014): Showcase

Born in rural Lewis in 1926, Donald Smith is an intriguing hidden figure of Scottish art. He spent much of his career teaching in schools, where one of his young pupils was Arthur Watson, Past President of the Royal Scottish Academy: 'it was Donald Smith who guided our first steps and when, decades later, I saw his paintings and was delighted that they more than measured up to the man and the impression he had made on my younger self'.

Responding to the enormous social and cultural shifts in post-war Europe and America, he was an outward looking artist with an internationalist perspective, a Gael with one foot in the culture of mainland Scotland, and one in the Outer Hebrides. During his education at Gray's School of Art in Aberdeen in the early 1950s, Ian Fleming considered him to be the outstanding student of his year.

He developed an ambitious personal creative agenda, producing large-scale compositions based on the lives of island people. In 1962, Donald Smith moved from teaching at Aberdeen Grammar School to become head of the Art Department at Summerhill Academy in Aberdeen.  The family moved to Balmedie, a location that brought him close to working fishermen. During that period Donald Smith exhibited a number of works in Edinburgh at the Royal Scottish Academy and at the Society of Scottish artists

Having moved back to Lewis in 1974, he continued to contribute to the community through education and local organisations as well as continueing on as a crofter - remaining directly in touch with his subject matter as an artist. Donald Smith passed away on the island in 2014.