Art News

Artist Carrie Jean Goldsmith Collaboration with Tracey Neuls

Carrie Jean Goldsmith is a Canadian artist that combines bold colours and brush strokes in her paintings. Carrie’s use of a tonal gradation and bold injections of colour emulate her surroundings focusing on the emphasis of natural light. The tonal depth of her artwork results in rich and powerful imagery.
As well as exhibiting her own original work at The Other Art Fair in July 2021, Carrie collaborated with Tracey Neuls to customise a pair of the designer’s shoes. Tracey Neuls is Canadian fashion designer, founding the label Tracey Neuls in 2000. Tracey designs foot-ware by drawing attention simplicity through her use of shape and muted tonal colours, striving for simplicity whilst creating a shoe with a confident silhouettes allowing the wearer to boast their individuality.
This collaboration was a no brainer for us, both Carrie and Tracey work with shape and a perfected simplicity at the forefront of their work.
We asked Carrie a few questions about her practice and how she fared painting on a very different canvas…

How would you describe your art in a sentence? 

My art is gestural with broad brush strokes from a rich, deep palette.

Like Tracey, you get your inspiration from your surroundings. How does this translate into your paintings?

I can be inspired by the way light falls on the ground or by how I feel when immersed in the sounds and scents of a place. I don’t paint en plein air but I translate what I’ve seen and felt in the studio. I don’t often know what is going to happen when I start a painting; I prefer to allow things to unfold organically in a process of layers.

You have quite a distinctive colour palette and seem to work in sequence as if one painting naturally leads on to the next. Tell us more about that…

That’s so true. Once I have a palette I’m happy with I will often do a series utilising it. Then, to my surprise, paintings will almost fit together like puzzle pieces; this happens subconsciously and always surprises me. There can literally be marks leading from one painting to another.

What was the biggest challenge of hand-painting the MAGRITTE? What did you want to evoke?

I was a little nervous because when I opened the box, the boots took my breath away; they are so beautifully made and I was worried about putting paint onto something so perfect. I had had a couple of practice sessions with shoes from a charity shop but their surface was much smoother. I was concerned the paint would be soaked straight into the leather but I was delighted to find the surface utterly delicious to paint on. I wanted to try to recreate one of my paintings, well the marks and palette anyway, on to a shoe and I’m so pleased and excited about the result.

What’s your first memory of a shoe?

The first thing I thought when I read this question wasn’t about a specific shoe but the sensation of the joy of throwing off my school shoes and socks to spend the summer in flip flops and sandals. However, at the end of a long hot summer, I absolutely loved putting on my new, hard school shoes with their heavenly leather aroma; there was something about the formality of them that felt so good after a feral summer!

View more of Carrie’s artworks on through the Online Studios, and for more information on Tracey Neuls’ collaboration, and to purchase Carrie’s shoe, view here.