Jeffrey Smart

Smart died of renal failure in Arezzo on 20 June 2013, aged 91.

Following his death, the University of South Australia announced on 21 June 2013 that the newest building at its City West campus, to be opened in 2014, would be named the "Jeffrey Smart Building".

Master of Stillness records the creation of Labyrinth (2011), Smart's final work before retiring aged 91. Critic John McDonald calls it "a farewell picture – a last definitive statement that rules a line under a long and distinguished career". Curator, author and critic Barry Pearce, interviewed in the film, says of Labyrinth: "It is a kind of arrival at the painting he was always chasing, never satisfied, hoping the next one on the easel would be the elusive masterpiece, the one that said it all." Hunter visited Smart at his farmhouse in Tuscany and the painter took her to some of the places near Arezzo that have long inspired him – the concrete streetscapes and urban wastelands that define his vision. "If a good painting comes off, it has a stillness, it has a perfection, and that's as great as anything that I think a musician or a poet can do", said Smart.

Smart was appointed an Officer of the Order of Australia in 2001 for his service to the visual arts, particularly through his distinctive portrayal of the urban landscape, and through the encouragement offered to young artists.

His autobiography, Not Quite Straight, was published in 1996. A major retrospective of his works travelled around Australian art galleries 1999–2000.

Smart departed Australia for London on the Castel Felice out of Sydney just after Christmas 1963, driving to Greece with fellow painter Justin O'Brien. In 1965 he returned to Italy, and lived there for the rest of his life, regarding himself as an "Australian living abroad" and carrying an Australian passport. His last work, "Labyrinth", was completed in 2011, at which point he announced his retirement.

In 1951, he moved to Sydney and spent the next 2 years there as an art critic for the Daily Telegraph (1952–54), an arts compere called Phidias for the ABC children's radio programme The Argonauts, and a drawing teacher at the National Art School (1956–62). From 1956 to 1962, he also presented on ABC-TV's Children's Hour. Smart was also employed by The King's School, Parramatta in 1954–56 as an Art teacher, following Jean Bellette (known as Mrs Haefliger) and John Passmore. He exhibited throughout this period at the Macquarie Galleries.

In 1951, Smart was awarded the Commonwealth Jubilee Art Prize. He was conferred the honorary title of Doctor of the University by the University of Sydney in 1990, and by the University of South Australia in 2011.

The two modernist realists who have had immense impact on Smart's paintings, are Alex Colville and Edward Hopper. Like Smart, Hopper painted "Human beings' values being swallowed by 20th century industrial society" and Hopper "shows that, even though communication and transportation have never been so accessible, the individual is somehow left behind in the rush". In his work, Hopper focuses on "eerily realistic depictions of solitude in contemporary American life", works of similar appearance to Smart's. Like Hopper's, Smart's paintings have been compared to post-war Italian movie stills of the 1950s and sixties – where beauty is poetically captured in the 'humdrum' Italian cities. Alex Colville painted desolate landscape settings with lonely characters, and used much the same geometric underpinning and bold colours.

Smart was born and educated in Adelaide where he worked as an Art teacher. After departing for Europe in 1948 he studied in Paris at La Grande Chaumière, and later at the Académie Montmartre under Fernand Léger. He returned to Australia 1951, living in Sydney, and began exhibiting frequently in 1957. In 1963, he moved to Italy. After a successful exhibition in London, he bought a rural property called "Posticcia Nuova" near Arezzo in Tuscany. He resided there with his partner until his death.

Smart travelled to Europe in 1948, studying in Paris at La Grand Chaumière and later the Académie Montmartre under Fernand Léger. "As my technique grew, I found I could paint those things I liked looking at, those slum streets behind the city apartments". In 1950 he lived on the island of Ischia in the bay of Naples, where he painted with Donald Friend, Michael Shannon and Jacqueline Hick.

Smart was a prolific artist; in the period 1939–82 he produced at least 800 works, and was still producing new works in 2011 (at the age of 90). The following are a small selection of Smart's work, arranged in chronological order.

Frank Jeffrey Edson Smart AO (26 July 1921 – 20 June 2013) was an expatriate Australian painter known for his precisionist depictions of urban landscapes that are "full of private jokes and playful allusions".

Jeff Smart, as he was generally known for the first thirty years of his life, was born in Adelaide in 1921. He started drawing at an early age. "My parents would give me large sheets of paper, often the backs of posters or calendars ... anything". He was educated at Pulteney Grammar School and Unley High School, and originally wanted to become an architect. However, after studying at the Adelaide Teachers College and the South Australian School of Art and Crafts in 1937–1941, he taught art in schools for the South Australian Education Department in 1942–1947. In the early 1940s he accompanied local maritime artist, John Giles, in painting industrial landscapes at Port Adelaide. He joined the Royal South Australian Society of Arts around 1941 and was elected vice-president in 1950. It was during this period that he acknowledged his homosexuality.