carlesmithart.com

Carl E. Smith is a California based artist and graphic designer. His recent work mostly includes collages that convey the beauty, excitement, ruin and rebirth of iconic elements from our everyday lives. Using symbols, colors, and space, Smith creates explosive images that seem to question his existence and its place somewhere between archetypical fantasy and truth.

Carl was born and raised in the artist colony of Laguna Beach, California. From 1997 to 2004 Smith lived and worked in Prague, Czech Republic. He has shown in small and large scale shows internationally since 1998 and currently is the creative director for Electric Visual in southern California. He resides in Laguna Beach with his wife Simona and son Sean.

Carl Smith is partnered with photographer Neil Buttermore

Carl: “I only met Jeff in person once at an event. He was an awesome person to party with and was full of life. He was a punk little kid and I liked that. I could tell that Jeff lived in the moment and that his life was raw and brimming with excitement. When I first laid eyes on Neil’s photograph I knew that he had captured a very special and insightful moment in Jeff’s life. I wanted to take his dream state like photo and add certain dream like elements that would express the lust for life and abstract attitude that I and most others (whether they have know Jeff personally or not) associate with Jeff Anderson. The entire collage process was executed in a fast, deliberate, and punk style that I think Jeff would have appreciated.”