Seven Days: Vermont's Independent Voice

Michael Smith

When he first started painting, it was simply a way to kill time during the night shift he worked at a psychiatric hospital in Florida. More than two decades later, Smith produces art full time from a studio above his garage in Underhill. He calls his creative endeavors "Low Mileage Art," because he has "always felt a deep, twisted kind of admiration for the used-car business," he writes on his website. The artist's absurdist sense of humor is evident in his colorful paintings, which exalt such mundane subjects as baked hams, electrical sockets and fluffy armchairs. His show, "Rural Pop Art and Other Behavioral Oddities," is at Jericho's Emile A. Gruppe Gallery through April 10. Pictured, "Lawn Chair."