Tracey-Maree Smith’s work is a metaphorical depiction of landscape, representing layers of history, hope, challenge and perseverance. She paints layer over convoluted layer, then begins to peel them back, leaving remnants and traces of what lay before.
She sees this in her own life and her own need to peel back layers of protection or personality to find herself. This is an ongoing process and sometimes she finds gems hidden beneath the surface and sometimes she still finds aspects of herself that she wants to cover up again.
She paints intuitively based on feelings, connection and emotion. Her work has a soul of it’s own — she is merely a conduit for some greater creative force that needs to express itself. This creative force is usually linked to her feelings about a certain time within certain landscapes.
Smith thinks that the one thing she can always remember about her life is the landscape she was in any particular time. She doesn’t feel like she has any connection to a place but rather to landscape. She spent part of her childhood in Moree and Collarenebri, Narrabri and she feels this gave her a feeling of connectedness to the dry, sometimes arid, hot and expansive country. She doesn’t feel as though she owns any part of the landscape but that it is a part of her and it is where she feels most at home.
