About The Artist Mavis Smith Mavis Smith has been drawing pictures her entire life. Her formal art training was at New York's Pratt Institute, where she majored in Illustration. Over the past fifteen years, she has written and/or illustrated dozens of children's books - a career she loves, but one that is being overridden by her increasing desire to work on her own painting and collages. "When asked if I work from life, I always say "yes" although I never set up an easel in front of a scenic spot or have a live model in front of me. Nor do I work from photos. My paintings are rarly of one single individual place that actually exists. They are people and scenes that exists in my head - composites of various experiences I've had over the years. I work from the collective memory of my experience of life." Copyright 1999 All rights reserved Concorde Fine Arts