Aaron Smith is clearly inspired by Victorian and Edwardian portraiture, in which the subjects possessed a kind of austere masculinity.
Yet he belies this stark virility with the use of broad impressionist strokes and vibrant colors. Life force emerges from these stoic poses.
Smith’s work seems to simultaneously conjure deeply rooted masculine archetypes, and surpass the cultural constraints generally superimposed on these archetypes.
SheWalksSoftly 