Paula Smithson is a practicing artist with a national and international exhibition profile who has participated in a number of practice based research projects. She studied BA (Hons) Fine Art, specialising in printmaking at the University of Central Lancashire graduating with a First Class Honours degree in 1999 and completed a Masters Degree in Illustration at Manchester Metropolitan University.

Smithson is interested in the human condition our physicality, our emotions, how we interact with the environment, and how we experience these in a space of tension, mood and atmosphere. Charged spaces such as theatres or circuses delight and disturb, arousing a range of emotions and leave lasting impressions.

Recent work under the heading ‘In The Spotlight’ is inspired by theatre and performance in particular Commedia de’lla Arte and the Carnivalesque, and has evolved through drawing on location at circuses and carnivals. Smithson is currently working on a series of screen prints, de-constructing and re-constructing them to create a series of small-scale dioramas and set designs that re-imagine these experiences and a series of multi-plate collagraphs.

Paula Smithson is a member of ArtLab Contemporary Print Studio
.http://artlabcontemporaryprint.org.uk