KEKAI KOTAKI
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Bio

​Born and raised on the Big Island of Hawaii, Kekai has always had a passion for art. Finding the sunshine and beautiful scenery distracting, he moved to dreary Seattle in 2000 to attend art school. After graduating, he proceeded to attempt a career at doing art. The first meaningful step was getting a job at ArenaNet, the makers of the Guild Wars franchise as a texture artist. Through hard work and more than a little luck, he was able to become a concept artist. With even more hard work and little more luck Kekai was to branch out into illustration work where he was able to do book covers and even a few Magic the Gathering cards.

Kekai still lives in Seattle. After 5 years as Lead Concept Artist on Guild Wars 2 and 8+ years total at ArenaNet, Kekai has left to go look for new endeavors. Over the years, Kekai has made stops at places such as Bungie and Monolith, working on titles like Destiny and Mordor Shadow of War. Kekai enjoys traveling the world and doing workshops demonstrating his process and thoughts about art.

Follow Me

Twitter
Instagram

Contact

kekai.k@gmail.com

Experience

ArenaNet, Amazon, Bungie, Monolith, Wizards of the Coast, Cinco Design, National Geographic, Simon & Schuster, DAW, Tor Books, Blur, Valiant Entertainment, Applibot Inc, Fantasy Flight Games, Paizo, ROBOT Communications, ImagineFX, Macmillan, Ballistic Publishing, Brilliance Audio, K2 Snowboarding

Publications and Awards

Spectrum 21
Spectrum 20
  • Gold Award - Institutional, Stampede
Spectrum 19
Spectrum 18
  • Gold Award - Concept Art, Riven Earth
Spectrum 17
Expose 8
  • Master Award, Charr Canon
  • Excellence Award, Cowboy vs Sandworms
Exotique 6
Spectrum 16
  • Silver Award - Concept Art, Snow Battle
Spectrum 15

Into the Pixel 2010
  • 1 piece selected, Kodan Attack
Into the Pixel 2009
  • 1 piece selected, Snow Battle
Into the Pixel 2008
  • 1 piece selected, Tyrantula

Expose 7
  • Excellence Award, Slayer
Expose 6
  • Excellence Award, Jora
Expose 5
  • Excellence Award, Balthazar
Expose 4

Exotique 5
Exotique 4
Exotique 3

Digital Art Masters 5, Cowboy vs Sandworms
Digital Art Masters 4, Warband

The Art of Games 2009 Collection
Fantasy 2 Best Artworks of CG Artists
ImagineFX 41, Cover art, Interview and Tutorial

The Art of Guild Wars 2
The Art of Guild Wars: Nightfall
The Art of Guild Wars: Factions
The Art of Guild Wars

Copyright © 2023, Kekai Kotaki. All rights reserved.