Gillian Lee Smith

Gillian Lee Smith is a mixed media artist based in Nottingham for the past 6 years. Born and raised in Scotland she relies on galleries to sell her work and is best known for her little sculpted melancholic dolls, as well as her series of drawings, paintings, costumes and textile pieces. Her work is inspired by memories and and stories of peoples lives, particularly story telling from the elderly. Often, Gillian works with dementia sufferers, using objects to stimulate their memories, as she finds the stories they tell her fascinating, and  helping people with dementia remember parts of their life is truly a magical feeling for her, motivating her work and her thoughts, some stories happy and others traumatic. She says "one elderly man was telling me about when he was a little boy, evacuated during the war. He was too young to understand, and he thought he was being taken away from his parents. Just imagine how distraught and confused he must have been." This reflects in her paintings and dolls, often lonely characters isolated in an echoing world of emptiness. Perhaps she is so enchanted by the stories of the elderly and the sick from her time as a nurse, and her work so heavily influenced by time gone by that she left nursing to study Costume Design at Edinborough College of Art, to push her ideas and creative thoughts down more of a theatrical avenue, expressing and exploring reminiscences in a whimsical manor. I believe this qualification gave her an insight into creating a character using a script (or a memory) which she does naturally, expressing emotion and ideas clearly. Gillian said her dolls have had such a successful response, and she has manage to sell more than she thought, though I know she should be charging a lot more for these small characters as so much thought, detail and time has one into each delicately hand crafted doll.
Gillian's drawings are built up using a variety of media such as oil and soft pastel, acrylic paint, oil paint, and ink. The pieces are "very personal," she explains, "they show what is inside us, what we try and hide." They are an illustration of peoples inner most secrets and fears. Gillian is currently focusing her time on painting rather than sculpture and textiles. She is enjoying experimenting with different media to create her 2D work. She says money isn't the reason for why she is concentration on painting and moving away from her dolls, but she advises that "paintings are seen differently to sculpture." She realised through noticing the price her dolls would go for, but her paintings are sold for a much higher price, "paintings are seen more valuable. I think people find it easier to connect with paintings than they do with sculptures." I understand what she means by that, very much in fact. Her paintings seem to have a depth to them, they have a much more expressive look to them, the way the characters fade into the background. They almost don't exist, like a lost memory trying to find its way back.