Jack Kaido is an abstract artist that immediately grabbed my attention. He is an artist that uses the digital medium for maximum impact. I find peace in looking and collecting his art and I recently had the opportunity to speak with him.

To find his works please visit his Linktree: https://linktr.ee/jackkaido

I’m Jack, I’m an anonymous digital abstract painter and would describe my art as an expressionistic exploration of the abstract image through the many possibilities of the digital medium.

I create in different ‘types’, as in styles, but in reference to digital art, I painted physically for many years and several years ago, decided to get into digital art. I cut my teeth making enough bad digital paintings and felt completely overwhelmed at first, mostly with all the possibilities and tools, but then I found my groove and since then, I have been exploring diverse ways of making abstract images that belong to a digital world.

My process isn’t rigid, it’s very much rolling. I create when I feel like it, which is pretty much daily because it’s not really a choice, and my whole life has been built around art and creating. Though sometimes I’ll take time away, and view that time as just as essential to the overall process.

Action is undoubtedly the way to surefire improvement but so is gestation — allowing yourself time to read, study other art, absorb more influences, and think upon what you might explore next or how you want to take your art forward.

When I create, sometimes I’ll go in with an idea or thought or feeling in mind and seek to consciously express that; at other times, I’ll just let it flow. Music is also integral to my process; I almost always paint whilst listening to music at the same time.

It’s hard to pin down influences to be honest because there’s so many who have had their impact in their own way, but I’ll try… At the very top is Willem De Kooning, no one has been more influential on my art than him and it’s not even close.

Then there’s the colour sages Hans Hoffman and Josef Albers, and Joan Mitchell, Mark Rothko, Richard Diebenkorn, Jackson Pollock, Agnes Martin, Arshile Gorky, Sam Francis, Helen Frakenthaler, Franz Kline, Ed Clark, Lee Krasner, Mary Abbot, Michael Goldberg, Edward Dugmore, Stephen Pace, Grace Hartigan, Clyfford Still, Wassily Kandinsky, Sam Francis, CY Twombly, Ben Nicholson, Barbara Hepworth, Howard Hodgkin and others.

There are figurative artists like Vincent van Gogh, Georges Seurat, Francis Bacon and Frank Auerbach, and Japanese woodblock artists such as Hokusai, Hiroshige, Hasai Kawase. Modern and/or digital artists include AERTIME, Robness, Aron Barath, Chepertom and Lisanne Haack.

Those are the ones that immediately come to mind. Other influences and inspiration include the work of writers and music too.

Pathways is a series of four works that explore a more minimalist approach than seen my existing 1/1s, and for these editions I sought for them to be distinctively different than what I have released so far; something unique to itself that was trying out something new for me artistically.

I’m a huge fan of the Japanese woodblock artists, and they are masters in gradients. Gradients are challenging to work with in an expressionistic non-figurative way — there’s limitations in colour relationships, about what colour gradients can go where, be placed on top off or sit alongside, and still look like it visually ‘works’, and without it being too rigid.

So, I wanted to see if I could create pieces that were immediately recognisable as digital art and very much belonging to the digital medium, and my own catalogue. I wanted to infuse these woodblock influences alongside other huge influences of artists of past — Diebenkorn, Rothko, Agnes Martin etc. One thing that gets lost is that these editions are made with large scale in mind. They are intended to be displayed large.

Whilst making these, I was also making several other strands of work to and jumping between ‘styles’ sees some of one style inescapably leaks into the other & vice versa. These different pathways were going in different directions yet bleeding into each other, like winding paths in a large forest, and artists often face a dilemma of choosing which pathway to go down and hoping it’s the right one. And just like a forest, sometimes you go down one and double back on yourself, other times you double down on that path and go somewhere, and maybe revisit another one years later. Or never again. And sometimes you just break from all the paths you’re familiar with and make a new path entirely.

The four works intentionally employ different palettes, styles, and techniques and each represents sort of a bridge to the other, as well as to older work.

Ever since my 1/1 prices went to around like 5 ETH, I’ve been asked loads if I would make editions work at accessible prices. Just how well the Nifty drop was received took me by great surprise, but this said, I have been asked a lot and some of that asking over that last year is reflected in that demand a bit.

I’m grateful for what has happened to my 1/1 prices over the last year. However, it is a strange feeling for an artist, wanting your art out there enjoyed by as many people as possible and knowing that 99% of people are priced out. This feeling would arrive daily with every comment or DM that I’d receive asking about editions.

So, I’m content that now everyone has had that opportunity, and prospective collectors of the future can readily collect an affordable edition online, at their leisure.

I’m conscious of what I release, both for my own reasons and for those who have invested in my 1/1s and my editions, so they will be the last editions of my pieces for a long time. Now that these are released, all my future attention is going on making 1/1s and pushing my own boundaries of what the abstract image can be, and where it can go digitally.

I will be focused on making the remaining Traces on SuperRare, which is a long-term project of 14 paintings released over 1 year, and which explores the incorporating of the internet as both a surface and medium for the abstract image. Some weird 1/1s are ahead. After that, well I have some ideas and some pathways to go down.

It was an honour to chat with Jack about his work and I am happy to have the piece AFAIK in the Dragons Den. If you want to see the piece than feel free to go to Jack's Linktree or drop by the Den to see his work and other amazing digital artists.

https://oncyber.io/dragonsden_art

DracheTech11