Influences

David Small had many influences at a young age helping to influence his path in life as an artist and his artistic style. From being enrolled in lessons at the Detroit Institute for Arts and having frequent school field trips there, David became truly inspired by the art constantly surrounding him. One piece in particular stood out among the rest for young David, a mural by Diego Rivera about the inner workings of the auto industry in Detroit. He said that from looking at that piece, he truly understood the power that art possessed in the way that it could visually capture and express all his thoughts and feelings towards something. The mural had such a profound effect on him that it encouraged him to develop his artistic talents and become a full-fledged artist.

        Detroit Industry Mural by Diego Rivera at the Detroit Institute for Arts    https://www.flickr.com/photos/sjb4photos/9033603417                                                                    

Another major influence for David came from walking around the hospital where his father worked. When he was waiting for his father to finish up work, he would often go around exploring the various rooms and visiting patients. About his excursions around the hospital, David said in an interview: “There, at an early age, I learned a lot about life and death and saw images of the living insides of the human body illuminated in the dark. Those ghostly, glowing, starkly beautiful images stayed with me”[1]. By reading Stitches, you can very well see the illustrations have the same imagery as just described.

Like most artists, his work was inspired by that of others. David has stated that the medium of art that has had the most profound effect on him has been his love of cinema. Cinema has always been a visually captivating form of art for him, because of the creativity that goes in to creating such beautiful imagery. It also expresses and captures feelings and moods beyond that of a still image. In another interview, David addresses his cinematic influences: “In film I like the guys that came along in the '60s and early '70s, along from Europe: Bunuel and Alansky and Bergman”[2]. These are of course, well-known foreign film directors.

Authors that have  helped to inspire and influence him are Anton Chekhov, Gustave Flaubert, and Leo Tolstoy.




Looking to get inspired too? Why not take a look at the Detroit Institute of Arts website:

http://www.dia.org/ 







[1] "David Small | Authors | Macmillan." Macmillan. Macmillan Publishers, n.d. Web. 4 Nov. 2015. 
[2] "Big Think Interview With David Small | Big Think." Big Think. N.p., 22 Nov. 2009. Web. 4 Nov. 2015.