Richard lee Smith Jr. is a painter of gaudily-colored, Mark-expressionist shapes with an undercurrent of spiritual commentary and personal growth. He was born in 1975 in Dallas, Texas. He studied at the San Francisco Art Institute, in California, receiving his BFA degree in 1997. Smith then moved back to Texas, and was diagnosed with cancer. Overcoming his battle. He later moved to Los Angeles to find a new healthy lifestyle in late 2002. He has had one-man exhibitions in San Francisco, Los Angeles and Dallas.