For the artist Bella McGoldrick, inspiration flourishes at the nexus between luxury and the everyday. Known for her hyper-realistic, colour pencil drawings of food, fashion and vintage lifestyle accoutrements, the New Zealand-born, Byron Bay-based McGoldrick relishes in the art of tangibility – drawing the viewer in with her playful manifestations of still-life objets on paper, from salted French butter to her version of Hotel du Havre’s Victoria sponge.
Here, McGoldrick sits down with T Australia to talk about how food became her muse, who she turns to for inspiration, and why hotel rooms never seem to live up to the hype.
Crème Brûlée coloured pencil on paper. Photograph courtesy of the artist.
Who is your biggest inspiration?
Anthony Bourdain. I like his way of making food feel relatable. I also like that he doesn’t enjoy fancy food as much as he does street food, and I try to carry that sensibility through my artworks. It’s the messy, unpolished side to food.
I also think the way Bourdain was able to speak about travel and new places — it all felt so sensorial. And since both food and travel is such a huge part of my work, I try to translate the newness of a city or food in a way that doesn’t feel pompous or uncomfortable. And I think that’s easy to do with food, because it’s so relatable. Everyone’s experienced it — it’s such an emotional vessel.
I also try to blur the lines between luxury and the everyday in a similar way [to Bourdain]. For example, you can have a street taco or a Michelin-starred taco, it’s a universal experience.
How has your creative practice changed over time?
I studied fashion design initially, but I’ve always been interested in drawing. In terms of developing my process, I’m in the depths of it right now as I’ve just finished a collection, so I’m back at square one again. When I’m at this point [looking for inspiration], I think it comes from doing it [drawing] rather than waiting for inspiration to hit you. Over the years, I’ve relied a lot on travel, because every time you go to a new place, everything is new. But now, because I have twins and I live in Australia, it’s become more difficult to travel for inspiration, so I’m still figuring that out.
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Can you talk us through how you developed your most recent collection?
The last collection was called “Room Service.” Once I decided on the inspiration, I started sourcing the objects I wanted to draw. If it’s a food piece, it’s definitely better if I can cook it at home. And my husband is a really good cook. One of the pieces in the collection is called “Room 208”, and it’s French fries on a silver platter. So, we sourced a French sterling silver platter and the little silver pots to use for the tomato sauce and mayonnaise, which we found during room service at a hotel.
And it [this collection] isn’t actually based on hotels we’ve stayed in. Again, it’s that kind of decadent, luxury feeling I like to play around with, because I don’t really like hotels. I like the idea and the whole premise of a hotel, but in reality, I don’t actually like them at all. This was an investigation into that — why do we want to stay at hotels? Who does that make us feel like we are?
Room 208 coloured pencil on paper. Photograph courtesy of the artist.
How did food come to play such a significant role in your work?
I think that food provides a lot of emotion and connects to the viewer in a really interesting way. I like the connection it has with the audience.
Do you have a favourite piece so far?
I have two. One is called “Puglia” and it’s a picnic setting with some broken bread and glasses. I made it when I was in Puglia in Southern Italy, and I think the composition is really interesting because it’s not just one item, it’s the combination of a few that tell a story. And the other piece is laid out like an open magazine and called “The Most Beautiful Girls In Ibiza”.
This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.
