Kurt Swinghammer is a multi-discipline artist who grew up in several small towns in Southern Ontario. While in his teens he exhibited paintings at galleries in Niagara Falls, won the Art Award in his final year at high school, and was active in the Niagara District Art Association and the Niagara Artist's Centre. He studied at the Ontario College of Art and Design and after moving permanently to Toronto in the mid 80’s, Kurt became identified with the vibrant Queen Street West scene through his club murals, album cover and T-shirt designs, and art direction for music videos. He has released 12 albums of original songs, appears as a session guitarist on over 100 albums by artists including Ani DiFranco and Great Big Sea, racked up over a hundred credits as a film and TV composer including David Suzuki’s The Nature of Things, and performed live on numerous CBC Radio broadcasts as well as international concerts.
Notable projects include set design for the award winning Joni Mitchell: Intimate and Interactive on MuchMusic, doing a custom paint job on the Zamboni at Maple Leaf Gardens, creating animated music videos for Buffy Sainte-Marie and Bruce Cockburn, designing a set for contemporary dancer Peggy Baker, appearing on the live Lillith Fair album, art directing the landmark hip-hop video Let Your Backbone Slide by Maestro Fresh Wes, and designing the store bag for the Sam The Record Man chain. In 2025 he was inducted into the Niagara Falls Arts & Culture Wall of Fame whose objectives are: Serve as a visual memory of artistic and cultural contributions in the City of Niagara Falls. Ensure that both past and present residents receive due recognition for their artistic and cultural contributions.
About the art work
"Over the years I’ve explored a wide variety of styles, mediums and techniques while balancing commercial and personal fine art projects. My current work employs a labour intensive approach of applying thin, flat layers of liquid acrylic and creating a sense of spatial depth through the use of carefully mixed colours. The average painting takes me 7 to 8 days to complete. I combine disciplined free hand painting as well as masking techniques that connect to the aesthetic of hard edge abstraction and graphic design popular in the 60’s - an early inspiration for me. As a youngster I was also very moved by the work of Tom Thomson and the Group of Seven, and I reflect similar subject matter with a modern sensibility.
The print editions start with an original painting imported into the digital realm by stitching together dozens of individual scans. I digitally “repaint” the piece to remove all artifacts of light and texture so that the final image is a flat graphic, and not simply a photo-based reproduction of a painting. This process achieves a result more akin to a silkscreen or lithograph, but with an incredibly complex range of saturated colours unachievable through those traditional printing techniques. By using these additional manual steps my paintings translate to this medium exceptionally well."
The prints are produced at GSQ Giclee Boutique in Toronto using high quality acid- free paper and archival inks. Each is personally inspected, hand numbered and signed, and safely stored in a cardboard mailer.
Kurt Swinghammer is represented in the permanent collection of the Canada Council Art Bank.
He sells his work privately, happily accepts commissions, and visits to his downtown Toronto studio can be arranged if you’d like to see paintings in person.