One of my favorite recent artist discoveries is californian art professor Aaron Smith. His bold brush work is of sculptural quality. The thickness of paint that he applies adds a unique dimension to his interpretation of the – almost Edwardian – subjects in his portraits.

Aaron also runs an impressive array of blogs and tumblrs, sharing his sources of inspiration as well as giving the viewer an insight into his working process. A lot of his inspiration derives from the old masters. Besides the obvious, like Caravaggio, Aaron also regards Swiss painter Ferdinand Hodler as a major influence on his work, which of course gives him some extra credits in my “patriotic” book.

Aarons’ work is completely intuitive. He doesn’t draw on the canvas and I think he neither does much of a warm up dance. He “loads up his brush with paint” and lets the stroke guide him down an unpaved road, constantly adapting to what happens on the journey.

Maybe that’s sometimes not the efficient way to paint… but the results surely speak for themselves.

Aaron is represented by dear Alix of Sloan Fine Arts in New York. I’m looking forward to seeing his latest works, presented at SCOPE Miami in a few weeks.