It would be rash to try to pigeon-hole Paki Smith. His exhibition of paintings, The Holy Shiver, has just opened at the Taylor Gallery. It coincides with the launch of his artist's book, The Rose Hedge, published by the Dublin imprint, Mermaid Turbulence. And he was co-designer on the recently released feature film Sweety Barrett. Now in his mid-30s, he is a tall, gangly bundle of nervous energy with a slightly unworldly, genteel air, a bit like an Edwardian time-traveller who is, to his surprise, rather taken with the 1990s.
He is especially excited about the book. "There aren't very many words in it, which I admit is kind of unusual." It is full of images though, strange, colourful, phantasmagoric images of magical landscapes, creatures and symbols, like a story-book for grown-ups. It begins with a dream, "and in a way it's all about dreams. Some dreams ring bells, some don't. When they do, they're like a clue to something, to why we're here, perhaps."
Smith's work has always embodied this sense of personal quest, of life as a spiritual adventure. From early on his paintings and drawings took elements of Christianity and Eastern religions, and various kinds of myth, to create his own rich personal symbolism. The visionary quality of his imagination invited comparisons with William Blake, which he is by now quite philosophical about. But he emphasises that he was never doing an ironic, post-modern version of Blake. "People brought up the Blake thing, but it wasn't until they said it that I began to really look at Blake. I think it's a two-way conversation. Why do you react to things you like if it's not because they're saying something to you?"
Much of his favourite imagery - such as disembodied limbs, floating eyes, walled cities, pillars of flame, strange animals - is there in his recent work. But his paintings have become less illustrative, more relaxed in themselves. "There are similar images coming back into it, but I suppose I'm not trying to pin everything down. It's as if I can now accept that some things simply remain unknown. You know the way the Romans had a shrine to the Unknown God? After going through the list, the God for this and the God for that, they'd very wisely add one in for the mystery behind it all, the indefinable something making it all happen."
Two very different landscapes inspired him, Sri Lanka, where he spent some time in 1995, and north Mayo, which he visited more recently, courtesy of the Ballinglen Arts Foundation in Ballycastle. The hot, exotic colours of Sri Lanka are easy to pick out in both exhibition and book, and they are very much in keeping with what we expect of him. "I felt very much at home in Sri Lanka. I know it sounds silly, but I did feel as if I'd been there before."
Once you look for it, Mayo is equally recognisable as an influence, if a little unexpected. "There's no avoiding the weather in Mayo, that's for sure. You have to notice it." He went there after doing some film work, and several of his paintings imagine the view out over the Atlantic, with the weather rolling in from the west, as God's own stage-set, complete with celestial lights and smoke machine.
"It's a weird experience working on a film. It is like its own little world. It's very intense for a short period of time and then it's over. What's good is working with other people, but it's also incredibly frustrating because you're not in charge. I'd love to make my own films. But I'm grateful to film for making me realise what an extraordinary thing it is to be trying to make paintings."
The idea of an artist's book isn't new for him. He has made a lot of books, including some quite elaborate ones, but they have always been unique objects. Some of them have walk-on parts in The Rose Hedge, from battered-looking notebooks with just a few words scrawled across the pages ("They're actually some of my favourite pages in the book") to richly embellished cloth-bound productions. There are also some personal memorabilia relating to his grandfather, Alfred William Tucker, who fought with the Royal Dublin Fusiliers in the first World War, to his time in Sri Lanka and, incongruously, the wrapping from a tin of Lustre peaches. "It's the original gouache for the label. My father did that. He gave it to me with the idea of my coming up with a new design, but I found I couldn't improve on it. So there it is."
It's five years since his last solo show, a gap largely due to his other activities. While he enjoys the design work, he acknowledges that it does limit the time he has for his own projects. "But I appreciate it all the more. I'm happier doing this than I've ever been, even though I'm doing less of it. Maybe it's something to do with being in your 30s: you feel this is what I should be doing, why don't I just get on with it? Whether we make gardens, or paintings, or whatever, I think what we're really doing is making our own little versions of paradise."
Paki Smith's exhibition The Holy Shiver: Paintings and Notebooks is at the Taylor Galleries until May 29th. The Rose Hedge: An Artist's Book is published by mermaid turbulence at £23.
