Vewn (real name Victoria Vincent) is an artist and animator based in Los Angeles, California. As a kid, she got into creating and editing videos for the online video game RuneScape, and eventually combined her love for films and drawing through animation. She graduated from the California Institute of the Arts (Calarts) and creates short films ranging from under a minute to ten minutes long, which she posts on her Youtube channel, vewn. Though her channel only has 14 videos, they have racked up over a total of 23 million views, and her channel has over 640,000 subscribers.
Vewn is well-known for her unique art style which she employs to full use in her animations and artwork.
A notable feature of her art style is her expertise in setting the atmosphere of each scene. With her usage of bright, harsh and unnatural colours, gritty and raw pencil textures, exaggerated anatomy and perspective, her work has a vivid sense of otherworldliness and unease. Her animation also has a signature ‘jittering’ effect that amplifies the dynamism of her artwork.
Another trait particular to Vewn is her exploration of different dark themes in her animated works. For example, dead end explores moral hypocrisy through the crossing paths of an anarchical school delinquent and the school counsellor that morally berates him, but is secretly addicted to online gambling. kittykat96 and floatland both look at themes of dissonance in self-identity and isolation, with the former through an influencer who struggles to merge her perceived online identity with her self in real life, and a shut-in who loses herself in her alternate video game world. The sense of existential dread is something that resonates deeply with my generation, and this juxtaposition with her bright and colourful characters and style is jarring and surreal.
Lastly, I adore the general absurdism and dark humour that Vewn injects into her work. For instance, mask dog is a short animation that follows a dog who puts on a mask and is arrested by the police and sentenced to death, but narrowly escapes death when the executioner pulls off his mask and says “Wait…this is a dog.”
All in all, I love Vewn’s style, originality and the way she juxtaposes her dark themes with bright colours and fun characters. Her confidence and steadfastness with her unique animations is something that I want to emulate. 🙂
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