Kaye McFadyen Art

Kaye McFadyen

About

Kaye McFadyen is a contemporary Scottish painter based in Glasgow whose work explores the emotional and sensory experience of Scotland’s western coastline. Rather than depicting the landscape itself, her paintings seek to express what it feels like to stand within it, to experience the movement of weather, shifting light, sea and wind, and the profound connection between place, memory and atmosphere.

Working predominantly in oil, Kaye creates paintings that emerge from direct engagement with the landscape. Long coastal walks, sketchbook studies, photography and the collection of natural objects form the foundation of her practice. These experiences are carried back into the studio, where memory and observation combine to create paintings that are intuitive, expressive and atmospheric.

Rather than recording a specific location, her work explores the spaces between land and sea, movement and stillness, presence and memory. Layers of paint evolve slowly, allowing each work to become less about describing a place and more about conveying an embodied experience of being immersed within it.

Earlier in her practice, Kaye explored vulnerability through portraiture, often concealing or closing the eyes of her subjects to suggest an inner emotional world. That same search for emotional truth now continues through landscape, where sea, sky, light and weather become metaphors for human experience.

Kaye graduated with a First Class BA (Hons) in Painting from the Open College of the Arts, awarded by The Open University. She continues to develop a contemporary painting practice centred on Scotland’s west coast, creating work that explores the spaces between land, sea, memory and atmosphere.

“I paint the experience of being within the landscape.”

Education

Education

First Class BA (Hons) Painting
Open College of the Arts / The Open University
2026

Exhibitions

2026

Solo Exhibition (Title to be confirmed)
Ceann na h-Airigh, Grimsay, North Uist
November – December 2026

Uist Arts Association Summer Exhibition
Taigh Chearsabhagh Museum & Arts Centre, North Uist
27 June – 8 August 2026

Art Without Borders Open Exhibition
Dùsgadh
Baile na Cille, Isle of Lewis
4 – 27 March 2026

2025

BA Degree Show – Where the Ocean Remembers the Sky
An Lanntair, Stornoway, Isle of Lewis
July – August 2025

Uist Arts Association Summer Exhibition
Taigh Chearsabhagh Museum & Arts Centre, North Uist
June – August 2025

Uist Arts Association Winter Exhibition – Peace
Taigh Chearsabhagh Museum & Arts Centre, North Uist

Accord Art Exhibition
Paisley Art Department
May 2025

2024

Force and Fantasy (with Alison Lesson)
Artsteps Online Exhibition

Residencies and Field Research

  • Self-directed Residency – Isle of Harris — July 2024
  • Self-directed Residency – Isle of Arran — September 2024
  • Self-directed Residency – Argyll & Bute — October 2024
  • Self-directed Residency – Isle of Bute — March 2025
  • Self-directed Residency – Isle of Skye (Kildonan) — April 2025
  • Self-directed Residency – Isle of Lewis, Harris & North Uist — September 2025
  • Self-directed Residency – Isle of Arran (Kings Cross) — May 2026

Awards

Enterprise Enhancement Scheme
Open College of the Arts
2025

Awarded in support of professional development and studio practice.

Collections

Works are held in private collections across the United Kingdom.

Studio Practice

  • Oil Painting
  • Acrylic & Mixed Media
  • Plein Air Studies
  • Research-led Sketchbook Practice
  • Artist Talks
  • Workshops
  • Commissions by Enquiry

Contemporary Scottish Painter
Glasgow, Scotland
|📧 Email: kayemcfadyen@gmail.com 📷 Instagram: @kayemcfadyenart