The Hartford Courant; May 10, 1946
Drawings Made While In Army Service to Continue on View
Vincent T. Smarkusz, of New Britain, a graduate of the Hartford Art School, has returned from service in the Pacific, bringing with him some exceptionally fine drawings. About 30 of them will remain on view at the art school for a short period.
Mr. Smarkusz went into the Army after art school in the Spring of 1941, and after some time with Anti Aircraft and the Air Corps, ended up in Okinawa and the Philippines as a gunner on an A-20. The drawings do not owe their distinction to being records of war, primarily, though war is their subject matter. There are no scenes of combat. What Mr. Smarkusz has depicted has largely been the routine phases or moments of life in service and its surroundings in PTO [Pacific Theater of Operations]. He has not looked upon his experiences with the eyes of a historian or a dramatist, but entirely as an artist.
"Genuinely Pictures" - a review of Smarkusz's show by James Johnson Sweeney:
Ideas, comment and observation are the chief pursuit of most artists today. Mr. Smarkusz's work however adheres to the great classical tradition, the tradition of the Brueghels for example, in its overwhelming interest in materials, in objects, even in persons as objects. The immediate topic may be "Confession", but along with the kneeling soldiers before a portable altar he will record with bright and loving care every rock, every shock of grass, every footprint in the muddle of tracks on the sand, the tiny pool of water, the bolt heads on the truck. The welter of objects stacked in a tent, above, around, below the cot, will be drawn with infinite detail, a curiosity about every texture, a fondness for every fold, a response to every shape and form.
At the same time, the sum total of Mr. Smarkusz's work transcends the sheer cratsmanship with which he so excellently renders and constructs, even when his tools are only a fountain pen or pencil stub. The best of them are pictures in the genuine sense, not merely etudes, because he sees all these facts with imagination, sensitivity and kindling affection. Not all of the drawings on view appear to have been completed, yet even the least complete escape being "sketches", with that word's implication of hasty jottings like some kind of memorandum to be referred to later for some other art purpose. Mr. Smarkusz's work seems to be substantially done, closely seen, thorough and inspired from the beginning. It is a great pleasure nowadays to find an artist who regards drawings as an end in itself.
James Johnson Sweeney, Director of MoMA, 1946
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