Article By: Amanda Dobek
Photographs By: Kumasi Lewis

The first time I stepped into the gallery space to meet Kai Samuel-Davis, I was slightly taken aback. I didn’t really have any expectations of what I thought the gallery would be like, but when I stepped into this colorful and organic free space, I immediately felt at home. The gallery was a fairly open outdoor space, with a bush, or tree of sorts spreading its vast branches and leafy ceiling over half the space. Art was present everywhere, to be had, experienced, analyzed and enjoyed. It was in every small hole, nook, cranny, bookshelf, and even in the branches of the ceiling. I found Kai located in one of the rooms off the central room and was immediately enthralled by his artwork.

Kai, a native to upstate New York – Catskill, New York to be precise, knew at a young age that he wanted to paint. As young as five years old, he found himself drawn to the brush, but after a discretionary word from his mother: art doesn’t exactly make money to pay the bills; he decided to take a detour in his career path for a few years. As time wore on, he took a few art classes during his high school career, tried college for a year, and then dropped out to work at a telemarketing company for a year. He then returned to college at SUNY Purchase and decided to major in film, but during most of his time at Purchase he was able to take art and illustration classes. He continued his education at The Art Center in Pasadena while living in the area.

Kai defines his work as contemporary portraiture, and favors the use of oils over other mediums. At one point in his career, he used acrylics and was drawn to them because of their fast drying capabilities, which allows the artist to build layers within their piece. Laying allows such things as depth, and shadowing to occur and even adds an element of texture to the piece. But this phase didn’t last long as Kai “snapped” out of his acrylic-hypnotized state and returned back again to oils. He enjoys oils because he can lay down all his color and manipulate it within a reasonable amount of time, and then let the piece dry over night and be ready to sell it a few hours later. “It’s the immediacy of it. I can sit down with a wooden panel, a brush and some paint and within a few hours or a day I have this product. I can create a whole entire [piece], start to finish, within a day. Where as with film, it’s so much of a process leading up to it and just the prep and the planning, I just kinda get lost with all that,” says Kai.

Subject matter for Kai’s pieces is primarily portraits and landscapes. He prefers to use photographs to paint from because he finds painting with a live model is sometimes stressful and time consuming. He pulls images from his own collects as well as finding images on Google or Flicker. He usually tends to his own photographs just for the simple fact that they are of his own vision and from his perspective.

When Kai isn’t toiling around in his studio he is commissioned for his work —though he doesn’t tend to advertise it. Commissioned pieces tend to be more strenuous and cause excess anxiety – where as when Kai is in his studio, he can paint more organically without having to meet someone else’s expectations. While most of Kai’s work is completed within a day or two, he tends to work on multiple projects in one sitting. If a project doesn’t feel right at the time, he’ll move on to something else. It’s all about painting what comes out – and not forcing it.

Kai hopes someday to be able to paint solely to support himself and is in the process of sending his work to other galleries. He hopes someday to also start working on a larger scale. While Kai continues working towards his dreams, we at Yoo-N-LA can hardly wait to see his latest masterpieces!

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Spec Sheet

Name/Nickname: Kai Samuels-Davis

Birthplace: Catskill, NY

Height: 5′10”

Random/quirky facts: “Built my own backyard (fence, walkway, patio, table),. I’m a semi gourmet cook.”

Favorite things to do: “Paint, drink, fish, camp, woodworking, listening to records, watching the bay (bodega), movies, making fires (in our stove), cooking.”

Most embarrassing life moment: “Hopefully, I’d drank too much to remember my most embarrassing moment”

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Contact Kai:

Website