Artist buries art across St. Louis for Easter hunt

ST. LOUIS -- A St. Louis artist is planning an unusual Easter art project in the city.

Rather than a hunt for eggs, artist Zack Smithey is encouraging people to search for 1,000 pieces of art he plans to hide around the city this week. The Easter Art Search will culminate with a reception Saturday for the winners to get their pieces autographed.

Smithey says the art, which took about 156 hours, is mostly acrylic and enamel paintings. He's been working on them for three months and spent about $10,000 on materials. He will hide about 100 pieces of art a day around the St. Louis area through Friday for the hunt.

"I've got a secret route planned for each day. As I hide them, I'm going to take a picture of each piece and post it on Facebook. If you can figure out where that picture was taken, you can try to find it. Where there's one piece, there will be more, spread out in the general area."

Smithey devised the Easter art hunt to get the public excited about art. The art pieces range in size from 12 by 12 inches to 32 by 48 inches.

Smithey hopes people who find his art, which he says is valued at about $500 per piece, will contact him and let him know whether they have decided to keep, sell, trade or donate the paintings.

"It's a three-month performance piece," he said. "Our lives are a series of moments of time. The art is a record of my life for the last three months; each piece is a slice from that timeline."