Werner Smith

Werner Smith (b. 1972, South Africa) spent nearly two decades as a game ranger and lodge manager across Botswana, Mozambique, and South Africa before picking up a paintbrush for the first time in 2015 — and made painting his full-time profession just one year later.
His work is defined by broad, seemingly wild brushstrokes that dissolve the human face into pure painted energy — simultaneously abstract and deeply intimate. In March 2018, Werner reached the finals of the prestigious Artbox Projects 1.0 show in New York. His paintings are exhibited on Saatchi Art and collected by private collectors internationally.
In 2025, Werner began pioneering a new body of work that extends his oil painting practice into hybrid digital painting — a new medium uniquely his own. He is based in Greyton, Western Cape, South Africa."