Jeffrey Smart was a painter and draughtsman, best known for his iconic portrayals of contemporary life, which have alternately been described as surreal and hyper-realistic. Widely considered to be one of Australial's greatest artists, Smart trained at the South Australian School of Arts and Crafts between 1937 and 1941, and later at the Académie Montmartre with Fernand Léger in Paris in 1949. In 1951, he returned to Australia, and worked as an art critic for the Daily Telegraph in Sydney, and was awarded a Commonwealth Jubilee Prize. During this time, Smart also worked for a children's radio program called The Argonauts, as a presenter on ABC-TV's Children's Hour, and as a drawing and art teacher at the National Art School and The King's School, Parramatta. In the early 1960s, Smart again left Australia for Europe, eventually settling in Italy in 1965, where he would remain for the rest of his life. His reputation gradually gained momentum, and he went on to achieve great critical and financial success. Throughout his career, he had numerous exhibitions around the world, at the Whitechapel and the Tate, in London, and at the Art Gallery of New South Wales. His works are also contained in many public and private collections, including The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, the Thyssen-Bornemisza Collection in Switzerland, the Yale University Art Gallery in Connecticut, and the National Gallery of Australia.