PAINTINGS inspired by childhood memories could win a Barnards Green artist top prize in a prestigious European art award.

Alan Smith, of Geraldine Road, is one of 29 people short-listed from 4,000 entrants for the Lexmark European Art Prize, launched last year to raise the profile of painting.

If the painting, from a series of 40 entitled Ellipsis, is successful, Mr Smith could win £20,000.

Mr Smith works on wooden panels prepared with gesso, layering, polishing and removing oil paint to create what he describes as 'recovered' paintings.

"It stems from early childhood memories - my father was constantly redecorating, trying to make what was quite a poor house very nice. I'm trying to draw parallels with that," he said, "But it's more like trying to write a poem where you allude to something, rather than a novel where you're describing it. It evokes a feeling."

Mr Smith said he was delighted to be short-listed for the award, both because he was picked from 4,000 entrants and because it champions painting over fashionable conceptual art.

"It's not that I'm against other kinds of work - all that really matters in the end is whether the work's good or bad," he said.

"It's just that I'm fascinated by painting. It's the sense of making something out of nothing - there's a kind of alchemy about just using ordinary stuff like paint and traditional shapes and thinking, can you come up with anything that's different."

Mr Smith trained at what was then Cheltenham College of Art and Design, where he is now a fine art lecturer, before going on to complete a MA at reading University.

He lived in London for a period and moved to Malvern around 12 years ago.

His work has been exhibited at galleries in Chicago and Berlin and more recently in Worcester City Art Gallery March last year.