Original Painting of an Amazing Fall Landscape [SOLD]

Sam Smith was one of the most accomplished Albuquerque artists during the mid-20th century. He was a friend of Wilson Hurley, who had praised his artistic accomplishments.  He had moved to Albuquerque at the age of 7 years, and was associated with the University of New Mexico art department from 1956 until his retirement as a professor of art in 1984. He had studied with artists Randall Davey, Jack Levine, Ben Turner and Carl Von Hassler. During World War II, he documented combat scenes while on duty in West Africa and in the China-Burma-India Theater.

The artist created an amazingly beautiful landscape scene by using a kaleidoscope of colors and a multitude of fine line strokes and mixtures of texture.  It presents to us a fall season of beautiful colors that inspires us to search out this area of the woods so that we could continue appreciating its absolute splendor.  It makes one think of an enchanted forest that exists in fiction rather than real-life.  It is a captivating painting.

Smith’s paintings have been exhibited at the Metropolitan Museum in New York, the Biltmore Galleries in Los Angeles, the Corcoran Gallery in Washington, D.C., the New Mexico Museum of Art in Santa Fe, the Fine Arts Galleries at the University of New Mexico and the Roswell Museum and Art Center. His work can be seen in the permanent collections of the Panhandle Plains Historical Museum in Canyon, Texas, Arlington State College in Texas, the Air Force Art Collection and the New Mexico State Fair Collection. His awards include the 1960 Oil Purchase Prize at the New Mexico State Fair, the Questa Purchase Prize in 1962, the Grand Award Prize at the Artist’s Alpine Holiday Show in 1964 and 1965 and the Grand Award at the Black Canyon Art Exhibition in Hotchkiss, Colorado.

Condition: excellent condition having just been professionally cleaned.  It is beautifully framed and ready to hang.

Provenance: from a gentleman in Utah who inherited it from family