Kayden Stephenson

The theme and title of the piece is Beauty behind the rough, and the mediums I have used are acrylic painting and a clay head sculpture. The main tones in these pieces are reds and browns, with a mauve colour on the hair to help it stand out from the background.  The pieces are rough with some softer tones (E.g., Rocks in the painting, rough texture in the skin of the sculpt.) 

My painting is a landscape containing an active volcano, with a rough mountain exterior, the sky is a “dark sky” containing specks of blue, pinks and purples, a visible stary galaxy visible above the rough and dangerous terrain. The sculpt consists of brown and red tones, with pale skin which blends in with the surrounding. The hair has mauve tones hair and the skin is rough and scaled. 

The work explores how we all view the world differently, some staring at the disaster and danger, others seeing the beauty behind it all. 

My work is influenced by Yuanxing Liang and other fantasy artists. My motivation as an artist is seeing how my work is viewed differently in everyone’s eyes, some finding it pleasant, and some finding it rough. I chose to paint rather than draw due to the emotion you can convey on a canvas with just acrylics, using brush stokes and various washes of colour. In my sculpt I focused more on the larger marks of the face, making it appear more weathered, however the rocks on the painting are more blended out, matching up with the gradient sky.