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Heather Smith

@ponytornado

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artist educator face-painter happy-camper in hamilton, on.
👩🏻‍🎨 — @heatherksmith.studio
🎨🙋🏻‍♀️— @heatherksmith.teaches

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Hi friends! In an effort to organize all of my hats I’ve created two new profiles with specific focuses on fine art and art education.

@heatherksmith.studio is where you’ll find my original artwork, including acrylic, watercolour, and oil paintings, stained glass, drawing and collage, sculpture, digital illustration and face-painting, too. ✏️ 👩🏻‍🎨

@heatherksmith.teaches is where you’ll find projects, shows, and demos related to teaching art to youth in the GTA, privately and via Dundas Valley School of Art (@dvsa.ca). 🎨 🙋

@ponytornado shall remain my personal domain for friends and family, or anyone intrigued by random eclectic nonsense 💁🏻‍♀️🌿

Thanks for being here! ✨ by @ponytornado

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a year ago

Hamilton’s Sweethearts
Acrylic Gouache on Cradled Wood Panels, Rusted Bolts
20” x 19.75”

Inspired by the theme “GRIT” — @j.letten_art and @lkheaney ‘s latest curatorial project for Supercrawl — I had a great time making this experimental new piece.

The inherent dichotomy of industry and nature in Hamilton has always gripped my heart, and I wanted to capture that feeling of hope and joy thriving within a worn utilitarian space.

@slotducks ‘ fantastic bird photography provided the final image inspo and references (swipe to slide six for the OG risqué models 👀), and @bitsandboards.ca did an incredible job of manufacturing the support to my sketchy specifications. (We’d originally planned to use a naturally rusted old bolt to join the panels, but when that plan faltered, Derek speed-rusted new bolts to complete the vision!) This piece wouldn’t have come together nearly as well without help from these great pals 🙏

The sky and smokestack were loosely referenced from an old photo I snapped years ago near the north-end of Wellington.

Available for purchase and for viewing (along with 59 other gritty beauties from Hamilton artists!!) at @b_side_farside until October 5th! 🏭 ☁️ 🐦 taken in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada by @ponytornado

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20 days ago

Stoked to be participating in this fantastically curated show, and cannot wait to see everything in person at the opening during Hamilton’s Supercrawl this Friday Sept 11th!

Swipe for a mini sneak peek of my piece, Hamilton’s Sweethearts (and the incredible support for it custom-made by @bitsandboards.ca), as well as a comprehensive list of all sixty participating local artists.

B-Side Gallery is located toward the back of Farside Bar on James St N, and the show will stay up until October 5th. Bring a pal, grab a pint, get gritty 🏭🛤️🐦 taken in Farside by @ponytornado

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a month ago

Happy (belated) Birthday Cola!!

On some Saturday night in November, maybe a month or so after we said goodbye to Bucket, @ponytornado and I had a couple of drinks and, when we got home, found ourselves on the @hamiltonburlingtonspca website looking at dogs.

As we pulled up the page we saw they had a litter of puppies up for adoption, we thoughtfully discussed (encouraged each other) the idea, and immediately began applying. Heather was sure to temper her expectations, “if we’re lucky enough to get this puppy, etc”, but I was full on we-are-getting-this-dog about the whole thing. We shot the application off Saturday night and waited.

We got the email response a few days later saying the dog we had applied for had already been assigned to an adopter, but I could sign up as a secondary OR - they have the sister dog open and waiting if I wanted.

I immediately said hell yeah and they were like “great come tomorrow”. They had named her Twig, and after we had her for a week or two, we landed on renaming her Cola. By the SPCAs best estimates, her birthday was on or around August 14.

We couldn’t bring Odie to the SPCA for the meet and greet, so we had to assure them his reactivity would be overcome, and he would eventually be peaceful with her. We did not expect he would be good with her after about two hours AND that she would end up torturing him!!!

She has been a complete menace this past year, with tons of bouncy playful energy. She was a nightmare to potty train, especially once the five-week -30 snap hit in the winter.

She has eaten approx. $300 dollars in SAXX underwear and probably about the same amount in Crocs.

She is super eager to please and extremely food motivated, and loves fetch more than anyone in the world. She loves playing and meeting other dogs, which is tough to do with Odie.

Although she tortures Odie (like grabbing his hind leg and yanking it, tacking him full speed) she treats him as the boss. If the four of us go to play fetch, she takes the ball back to Odie every time.

Anyway, there is a bunch of random facts about this pooping, underwear and croc eating, absolute menace of a puppy, whom I love with all my heart. by @ponytornado

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a month ago

It's time!! June 7, 11-4, Open Garden and Art Show. #hamont #dundas #localartists #artshow #opengarden by @ponytornado

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5 months ago

Along with BALL, this little gem of mine - Mid May Midnight - is also available in @dvsa.ca ‘s 55th Annual Art Auction! Online bidding in the silent auction continues through to this Sunday April 12th. Check these out, along with 1500+ beautiful pieces available at auction.dvsa.ca, supporting Dundas Valley School of Arts’ all-ages programming and local artists! (links in bio 🌸) by @ponytornado

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6 months ago

BALL
Acrylic Gouache, Conté, and Gesso on Cradled Wood Panels
8” x 16”

On Family Day, back in Feb, Andrew and I took the dogs on a snowy afternoon hike and stopped midway in a big field to teach Cola how to fetch. Later that evening after we were home and cozy and completing crossword puzzles, I doodled an exuberant leaping Cola across two pages of the puzzle book (swipe for evidence).

The doodle is tiny and bound to smudge; It’ll fade eventually, where it is, so I decided to use it as a wee study for a larger piece. The support is two 8”x8” panels bolted together (thank you @dejansoko.art for your help!), and the media is a little bit of an experiment for me; Wanting to mimic the sketchy feel of the original drawing, I laid down layers of black conté (essentially a stick of coloured mud), and applied gritty clear gesso in-between to keep it in place.

I really enjoyed making this fun little piece! She’ll be available this upcoming week in @dvsa.ca ‘s 55th Annual Art Auction, with online bidding in the silent auction beginning on Monday at auction.dvsa.ca (link in bio ✨) by @ponytornado

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6 months ago

❄️ Happy Holidogs from (sn)Odie and Col(d)a ❄️ by @ponytornado

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9 months ago

baby loves DS9 too 🥹✨ taken in Alpha Quadrant by @ponytornado

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9 months ago

This kid’s already grown 50% in size since @funhaverandrew and I brought her home so, probably time for an introduction!

We found her up town at the S P C A;
She’s black and brown and she looks just like cherry cola,
C O L A, Cola.
Co co, co co coooolaaaa

✨❤️🤎🖤 by @ponytornado

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10 months ago

Oct 8 2017 - Oct 1 2025

Andrew adopted Bucket from @hamiltonburlingtonspca in December 2017, when he was just ten weeks young. It would be another year before we all lived together, and in those formative months we’d have playdates for Bucket and Odie, letting them slowly learn each other’s weird play languages. It wasn’t until a polar vortex blizzard in the late fall of 2018 that I was snowed in at Andrew and JD’s with both dogs and we all spent the night there, that any remaining wariness between the boys fully dissipated overnight; Morning found them peacefully sharing the bed like brothers, and they were deeply bonded ever since.

Because of Odie’s unknown history and severe reactivity, their social lives stayed rather small and dog-park free. All of us love hiking and playing outdoors, so we sought unconventional times to let them explore trails and beaches and parks, opting for late night walks and cold windy romps along the shorelines of Hamilton, driving out to explore less populated trails.

Bucket relished a roll in soft plush grass, pausing on summer walks to loll on sunny lawns, and even more he LOVED to - literally - dive headfirst into fresh snow and plow his way through it. Big and clumsy but with a heart of gold, Bucket also did his very best over the years to befriend our old cat, Ammu. Deferring to her with canine reverence, he’d try to make his huge body as small and still as he possibly could and slowly nose in as close as she’d allow. (Continued in comments) by @ponytornado

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a year ago

Little Black Frame 2025 piece reveal ✨

Hamilton (feat. A&W lot and couch), 8 x 8, acrylic gouache on cradled wood panel

Swipe for a closer look, the itty bitty details, the way that the luminous red pigment reflects light differently, the underpainting and the photo ref taken downtown in October, and sweetiepie @shoestringhouse who chose this piece off the wall last night during @dvsa.ca ‘s 2025 Little Black Frame fundraiser!

The evening was a blast; Congrats to everyone who worked to put it together and a huge thank you to everyone who supported the event, our art school and local artists! by @ponytornado

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a year ago