W. Chris "Silver" Smith, Technologist & Artist

   W. Chris "Silver" Smith grew up in College Station, Texas, and after high school attended Texas A&M University, graduating with a bachelor's degree in Environmental Design from the College of Architecture in 1992. As a student, Smith was awarded A&M's highest artistic honors at Artfest, TAMU's annual student art competition, in 1991, garnering not only Best of Show and 1st Place in Painting, but also a 2nd in Drawing and a 3rd in Mixed Media.

   Smith's various campus-related artworks were exhibited in an exclusive one-man show in the Visual Arts Gallery within the TAMU Memorial Student Center (MSC) for three months in 1992.

   After graduation, Smith was hired on by the University as professional support staff, and he served as Manager of Administration & Services at the Cartographic Service Unit (more popularly marketed under the name "Cartographics") until October of 1996. During his employ at TAMU, Smith supplied professors and authors with numerous maps, scientific illustrations, and other commercial artworks which have been reproduced in books and professional journals all over.

   Most notably, during his employ at A&M, he also conceptualized, authored and illustrated the "Texas A&M University Map With Points of Interest", published by the TAMU Press, as well as the smaller A&M maps given out by various University offices. The Texas A&M University Map was created in time-honored classical traditions to be both functional, as well as a fine art piece suitable for framing. Smith further authored the TAMU Clip Art Disk^©, containing the official University trademarks (including the TAMU Seal, and the ATM logo) and traditional illustrations in digital format for the first time ever, which have since been reproduced many tens of thousands of times over on various Aggie products, newsletters, and elsewhere. Smith was the designer of the shield logo used by the 12th Man Foundation which may be seen most frequently on the vehicle decals of hundreds of thousands of Foundation members.

   The artwork of W. Chris Smith has touched the hearts of Aggies the world over, and his work in the University became an indelible part of the college life of many an Aggie.

   Smith has been employed by Verizon (NYSE:VZ) in the Dallas/Fort Worth area since moving from College Station in late 1996. He has served Verizon as Manager of Interactive Media Publications in the Technology & Advanced Development Department, handling project management, design and support of the many parts of the SuperPages.com website for a number of years. Smith was recently promoted to Head of the Technology & Advanced Development Department.

   He manages a team of programmers and designers who handle the overall design, maintenance, and application development of SuperPages.com. His teams handle cobranded yellow pages services for MSN, InfoSpace, Lycos, BigFoot, and more. The Technology Department handles: Taxonomy Development, Advertisement Publishing Liaison, Content Integration, User-Interface Development, Usability Research & Testing, and New & Emerging Technology Research. Smith was awarded the prestigious individual Verizon Excellence Award for his research and development of Superpages.com's Search Engine Optimization projects, from 2003-04. During his work for Verizon, Smith's work has resulted in the filing of five patents which are currently pending.

   Active in his church and other local associations, he also continues to develop his artistic skills, occasionally exhibiting in various shows or exclusively solo.

   Smith has served under his nickname, "Silver", as one of the leaders of the Dallas Gothics Community for the past 9 years, administrating the Metroplex's email list, the Dallas Gothics List (a.k.a. "DGL"), and assisting with various events. He portrayed the Mad Hatter at a gothic/fashion/art event held at the Art Landing in downtown Dallas in 2002. A brief review of the event was published in Gauthica, a Houston gothic scene zine. More photos of the event may be found here, and here.

   For more details on W. Chris "Silver" Smith's commercial work history, view his Curriculum Vitae.

Copyright © 2006 W. Chris "Silver" Smith. All rights reserved.