EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW: THE WINNER OF SKY ARTS LANDSCAPE ARTIST OF THE YEAR SERIES 11

The winner of the eleventh Series of Sky Arts Landscape Artist of the Year has been announced! After 6 heats, a Semi-Final and a nail-biting Final, Judges award-winning artist Tai Shan Schierenberg, independent curator Kathleen Soriano, and Director of Frieze London Eva Langret have selected their winner. The deserving artist won a £10,000 commission to paint the magnificent Croagh Patrick mountain in County Mayo, Ireland, for the National Gallery of Ireland.

Cass Art has supported the show since it began in 2015, supporting all participants with art materials throughout the competition as they capture inspiring UK landscapes in just four hours.

We caught up with the winner to find out more about their experience on the show and their exceptional commission.

WARNING SPOILERS BELOW!

AND THE WINNER IS…

KIM DAY!

Hi Kim! Huge congratulations on winning the eleventh Series of Sky Arts Landscape Artist of the Year! How did you feel going into the final?

Thank you! Going into the final was a peculiar mix of feelings; there was definitely excitement at the actual possibility of winning. Up to this point, every heat felt like it could be anybody’s day — no one really knows how their painting will go on the day, so it really is down to that last hour and whether you feel you have done the location and yourself justice. The final was so different to the rest of the heats because it was just the three of us, so there’s always that glimmer of hope! Having had a bit more time to create the local commission, there’s a sense that you’ve offered up your relative best, but I do remember when the team came to pick up my painting, I suddenly felt that I hadn’t done enough, and psychologically I’d started getting myself used to fact that this was the last wonderful part of the adventure. When people say it feels a little like a rollercoaster - it really does! The one bonus was that I let go of any sense of what might be the right thing to do at this point and just did whatever I fancied, so that aspect was really fun and satisfying.

In the Final, we saw you head to Scotland with your fellow finalists Tom Winter and Libby Walker to paint the Falkirk Wheel, the world's only rotating boat lift. Presented with another huge structure with graphic lines, you made a bold decision to crop into a small area at the base, focusing on the reflection in the water. The resulting painting walks a line somewhere between figuration and abstraction – where is that line for you, and how do you navigate it?

I was planning to paint the Falkirk Wheel directly from the Pod (that would normally have been my natural choice), but when we all had the chance to look around I just felt sure about this new view from the bottom. It’s always a fine line between figuration and abstraction, my painting for the semi-final felt very literal, and I wanted to get back to something more ‘me’. I love looking for the essential elements of an environment and reducing them down to passages of interplaying colour and mark making, the wheel gave us these great big curving forms and gave us so many compositional options to play with, it was just a case of finding a harmonious balance. It’s really hard to describe where I draw the line between the literal and the lyrical but it really is about letting the work talk back to you as you go along and you make that dance… just don’t hold on too tight to some idea of what the final piece should be and you will find it one of the most joyous forms of play.

In your painting of the Falkirk Wheel, your composition is balanced perfectly by a small, red dot, which was crucial to the colour balance of the painting. You talk about how excited you are by colour - can you describe your relationship with colour and your colour composition choices?

It was actually the ‘red dot’ (a lifebouy) that swung it for me that morning! I just love a bit of red in a painting, it’s just this emotional full stop within a composition - historically many artists have used a splash of red as a device e.g ‘Corot’s red cap’ …to lead the eye or surprise. I just loved that in that specific environment the red was naturally surrounded by its complementary green, and it pinned that side of the composition down against the weight of the Falkirk’s wheel base on the left. I think my main joy and motivation in painting is combining colours, it’s like you have a little bit of magic in your hands - if you are really lucky and you let things lead you along it’s almost like a painting paints itself. I’ve made so many paintings over the years where it’s not working or just kind of dies, slowly you get a little bit more familiar and find your way, and that’s such a good feeling. 

As part of the final, artists are asked to create a commission outside of the 4 hour time constraints of the Heats. For your commission, you painted an obscured view of the ruins of Corfe Castle in Dorset, near your home. We see the view through the dark trees in the foreground, with the warmth of the light coming through the leaves, and the cool blue ruins of the castle on the hills beyond. The judges were impressed by the poetry and energy in the work. What art materials did you use for this piece?

For my commission at home, I worked with all my usual materials, Winsor & Newton / Golden Acrylics, Acrylic flow improver and Acrylic Glaze. For my pastels I use Neocolour Caran d’Ache as they are soluble and I can mix them down with the glaze or flow improver. I use Acrylic felt brush pens from a number of brands, including Posca. And lastly charcoal, I love using charcoal, Nitram and Winsor & Newton are great, as well as Conte A Paris for compressed charcoals - it has this velvety quality and grain that you can’t really get with other mediums, I just make sure to seal them after I’ve finished with the work.

In the show, we learned of your 20-year career as a film scene illustrator. A lot of artists struggle with a good work/art-life balance. How do you think your career has influenced your artwork and do you have any tips for making time for art?

I have to admit it’s never been easy to balance my career with my painting, the days are long in the film industry! It was when I started working remotely more regularly that I had that little bit more time, but this would often mean just working at night or on the weekends if my husband was out with our son. You really have to have a fierce attitude about giving painting the time it needs to evolve, even ten minutes in a day makes a difference - anyone can do that! Ten minutes a day leads you forward. For example I would often have a little painting on the go in the kitchen with a little set of paints and pastels so that I could do a bit here and there when making dinner or if my son is home after school and playing. It all makes a difference, you just have to commit to honouring it. One last note is that working 10 hour days on films painting is like no other kind of training, although I’m not sure I’d recommend it ha ha!

For your final winning commission, you travelled to Ireland, to Westport, County Mayo to paint the magnificent Croagh Patrick mountain. You were introduced to a number of local people who were able to explain the deep connection they have with the mountain, and its religious significance, with many still making the pilgrimage to the top. How did these interactions and your own climb to the top impact your final commission?

Talking to the local community in Westport and on Croagh Patrick (or the “reek’ as it’s known locally) absolutely made all the difference to every element of the final painting. All derived from conversations with people’s personal experiences with the mountain. The way they used to walk it as children, the night pilgrimages with the whole community and their lanterns winding their way up the path. The Pilgrimages for penance or atonement by walking barefoot, or purely for exercise! We met an 80+ year old gentleman going up, this was something he did every month! It also has a rich pagan history that’s fascinating, the celebration of the Lughnasa festival & Lugh the Sun god, but of course it’s most widely known for St Patrick’s own Pilgrimage and fast for 40 days, casting out the snakes (I’m assuming those were more metaphorical!). There was even some saucy titbits thrown into the mix! Everything about that mountain is about its relationship to the people of Ireland and beyond, it would be impossible to separate the two. I feel grateful to have walked it and experienced that shared joy, wit and camaraderie with all the walkers and pilgrims!  

Your final winning commission will be hung in the same gallery which houses works by Caravaggio, Vermeer and other masters. How does it feel to know your work will be hung alongside these greats and what do you hope viewers will feel when they see it?

This really is the hardest thing to come to terms with for me, I don’t think I have yet absorbed the reality of it, to be honest. I get emotional just thinking about it. I mean, how many artist have something like this happen to them within their own lifetime?  I feel immensely humbled, and I hope more than anything that I have in some small way told the story of the mountain and the people of Ireland, that it resonates with the wider public, and with anyone who has a deep relationship with this stunning and significant part of the Irish landscape and consciousness. It is the wildest kind of privilege to now be part of the National Gallery of Ireland’s collection.

The final work is stunning! You chose to depict the mountain as warm and welcoming, with rich purples and oranges set against a yellow sky, a trail of glowing torch lights hovering above the path to the summit. Can you walk us through your process for making this piece?

I really felt that I needed to tell those stories I had heard over the week through the use of colour and composition, for example, I was told that at a certain time of the year, the sun appears to roll down the side of the mountain. I wanted to say all these different things without being too literal. The choice to cut the top of the mountain off was about the idea of all these journeys we make in life, often we think that there is some final destination in our mind’s eye, but really there never is, it’s just the journey - that’s all there is. I also wanted to describe the people of the mountain without painting actual people and felt that the story about the night pilgrimage with the lanterns must have been a magical sight, and how people and their souls can be like light if nurtured in positive ways and that there is always room for hope and redemption. We also had the great fortune to travel out to Achill, it is such an amazingly beautiful place and there was this moment when we were driving back, the light fell on the base of a valley so that it appeared to glow from within, darkening as it reached the summit and it really was a moment I wanted to hold on to, and that we all have this light and dark within ourselves - the mountain is our own nature …I could go on forever!

What advice would you give to artists considering applying for the next series?

Don’t think too hard about entering, just enter. Try to take any experience you may have connected with LAOTY as a bonus, keep your expectations low, because you will have more fun! whether you are a wildcard or in a pod. Lastly, try and think about your own work as an extension of yourself, if you can imbue your work with something particular to you, whether that’s the way you lay down paint, or your favourite colours, or a style quirk, lean into that and run with it! 

And finally, now your winning commission is complete, what’s next for you?

In terms of the future, I would love painting to be the predominant part of my daily life going forward, I have wanted that since I was barely a teenager. If being on this wonderful and positive program can bring that reality closer, I will be forever grateful. Thank you LAOTY!

Thanks Kim! See more of Kim’s work at dayfinearts.com or @day.finearts on Instagram.

ARE YOU THE NEXT WINNER?

If you think you have what it takes to be the next Sky Arts Landscape Artist of the Year, entries for Series 12 close on Monday 23^rd March 2026. Find out more and apply at skyartsartistoftheyear.tv/landscape. Good luck!

Feeling inspired?

Read our interviews with all of the Series 11 Heat Winners & Wildcards HERE on the Cass Art blog.

If you've admired the works on the series, visit artistoftheyear.co.uk where selected artworks from all eleven series, as well as from Sky Arts Portrait Artist of The Year, are now available to buy.

Image credits: Photography © Sky Arts, paintings © Storyvault.