Overview

Tygar Miles Smith (b. 1999) is a visual artist born and bred and in South East London, he studied at Camberwell Foundation (2018-19) before graduating from Central Saint Martins in 2023 with a BA in Fine Art. His practice is a manifestation of his own childhood along with the re-contextualisation of his siblings and surroundings. Beginning with the content of books that taught him how to read as a child Tygar proceeds to turn any prepossessed Ladybird book he gets his hands on into visual conundrums through the ambition of creating a life long work by following the rule 'a page a day'. Once one book is reconstructed he then moves onto the next; drawing, redacting, cutting, painting, gluing, collaging, adding, subtracting and manipulating text and image that turns not only the whole book itself but each individual page into an art work of their own existence. Stemming from these books comes the concept and theme 'redaction' which Tygar transforms into an abstract ideology through his gestural yet meticulous acrylic 'painted drawings' on raw canvas that depict re-contextualised drawings from the past or present overlayed with bars that are situated within a quadrilateral. These two opposing components together present a collaboration of 'past and present', a battle of 'order versus chaos' and the contradiction between 'spontaneous scribbles' transformed into 'patient dexterity'.