Yvonne Muinde
Founder
Ikweta Arts
Nairobi (Kenya)
Yvonne Muinde is a fine artist and digital painter who has been living and working in Canada and is now relocated and based in Nairobi.
Originally from Nairobi Kenya, Yvonne has been fortunate to have lots of great experiences when she lived in the USA, Australia, New Zealand and now Canada. All these experiences have helped forge her in to the person and artist she is.
Her educational background is in Fine arts studying at the Savannah College of Art and Design and then the Academy of Art college in San Francisco. Life and work have helped expand on that education, she started producing art work for shows and galleries in the San Francisco bay as well as shows in New Zealand. As well as being a muralist both for commercial murals and public art projects, she is a award wining digital matte painter in the film industry. One of Yvonne’s proudest moments was when she was awarded the mural commission for the Blair Caldwell African American Museum and Library in the city of Denver. Her pieces have been collected by several collectors and two of her sold pieces are in a group collection ‘The Chemistry of Color’ which is housed at the Philadelphia Fine Art Gallery.
Several years ago Yvonne transitioned into digital matte paintings working for world renowned Academy award winning directors on several high profile movies. In 2009 she, with her coworkers, were awarded the Visual Effects Society award for Matte painting for their work on Avatar.
Oil Painting is Yvonne’s passion, even though she has been fortunate to transition into several other aspects of image creation. Yvonne believes all visual art forms share a common purpose to evoke an emotion in the viewer that will challenge their thinking and how the viewer observes the world. Learning and mastering several mediums only helps this visual language and helps Yvonne identify what aspects of all these mediums she can bring back into her fine Art. Having taken a few years off for the most treasured experience of them all becoming mum, Yvonne has started working on a new series of oil paintings that she cannot wait to share with you, through motherhood she has learned to look at the world in a brand new way still striving to paint moving and thought evoking pieces. Stay Tuned!
EXPERIENCE
Matte painter
Ikweta Arts Ltd Nairobi, Kenya : Founder -Freelance Matte painting and concept Art 2018- present
Scanline VFX, Slate FX, Ubi Soft, Legion, Nairobi, KenyaRemote Freelance Matte painting and concepts. 2018-present.
Scanline VFX, Vancouver, Canada : Matte painting Supervisor 2014 – 2018
Credit List: San Andreas, Peter Pan, Independence Day, Guardians of the Galaxy II, The Promise, Black Panther, Batman hrs superman, Aquaman, Antman, Meg, Ben Hur, Pan, Ms peregrines home for opercular children, King Arthur, Game of Thorns, Cosmos, Batman vs Superman, Godzilla v Kong, Midway.
Scope: creating environment-based set ups that work over a multiple of shots and sequences to provide flexibility and adaptability across the pipe line. Working as a concept and and look dev artist for bidding purposes, shot production and client presentations. Department supervisor.
Weta Digital, Wellington New Zealand: Matte painter/Hod/Matte paint Supervisor 2006-2013
Credit list: The Hobbit- Desolation of Smaug, The Hobbit-An Unexpected Journey, Rise of the planet of the apes, Tintin, Avatar, The lovely bones, Knight and Day, Thirty days of night, Jumper, The Day the earth stood still, Eragon, Fantastic 4, Avengers, Caspian-Chronicles of Narnia, Gulliver’s Travels, Water Horse, Universals Ride-King Kong (3d)
Scope: Worked within client brief to create and develop matte paintings using maya, nuke and Photoshop to create 2.5D photorealistic matte paintings. Management and review and hiring of matte painters for department as well as developing pipeline for efficient creation of realistic matte paintings.
Animal Logic, Sydney, Australia – Senior matte painter 2004-2006
Credit list: Happy Feet
Scope: Worked within client brief to create and develop matte paintings using maya, company proprietary software and photoshop to create 2.5D photorealistic matte paintings.
Industrial Light and Magic, San Rafael, California 2003-2004
Credit list: Star wars Revenge of the Sith
Scope: Worked within client brief to create and develop matte paintings using maya, company proprietary software and Photoshop to create 2.5D photorealistic matte paintings.
Public Art and Muralist
Public art muralist, Blair Caldwell African American Research Library, Denver, Colorado, 2002
Awarded public art grant for development and completion of 26’ 11’ foot mural for the interior space of the Research Library.
City of Oakland 2002 Awarded individual artist grant for creation and exhibition of artwork
Commercial muralist 1998-2003
Mural Arts, Evans and Brown, Sausa Productions, Arts and imagination, San Francisco, California
Worked with a team of other muralist developing and executing murals for various commercial mural projects, clients included Harrah’s Casino, Cesar’s Palace.
Gallery Artist
Agora Gallery, New York, USA 2018
Fazakas Art Gallery, Vancouver Canada 2016- present
Thelma Harris art Gallery, Oakland California 2002-2014
Acci Gallery, Berkeley, California 2001-2002
Bradford Campbell Gallery, San Francisco, California 2000-2001
John Pence Gallery, San Francisco, California 1997-1999
Participated in several group and solo shows. My work is in several collections both private and public, most notable is the ‘Chemistry of color’ Philadelphia Academy of Fine arts collection.
Academy of Motion Pictures- Member 2018
Visual Effect Society – Member 2009- present and awarded VES for outstanding Matte Painting in Feature –AVATAR 2010
Homepage:
https://www.yvonnemuinde.com
Email: infomuinde@gmail.com