Kei Weaver + Studio Kei

My Art Journey

A large part of me got tucked away growing up closeted in rural Pennsylvania. I preferred girls clothing to guys, but endlessly got told I was shopping in the wrong section. Got put into soccer for being too feminine. Teased for having big feelings. For preferring reading and sewing over guns and hunting (despite my mom being an amazing hunter; sorry, mom). I was that one guy in home ec class, and I really loved making pillows.

I hid so many good parts of myself before I made it out. My natural impulses slowly diminished, and it made me stop trusting my own intuition. Giving in to a decade of bullying and outside pressure, to the degree I abandoned authentic parts of myself, is the greatest shame I have ever felt. And it’s taken so long to build things back up: good friends, good family, good therapist, improved habits...

I’ve spent decades trying to bring those parts of me back, to breathe life back into them, to give themselves—myself—space to just fucking exist, and to figure out what that means authentically.

Art ultimately became the best way I’ve found to understand myself. I started coming out right around when I ordered my first watercolor set in September 2021. I ordered a little set of 8 watercolors from Beam Paints in Canada, circles of creamy paint set into a round of birch. 2 core blues, 2 reds, canary yellow, lavender, robin's egg blue, and a vibrant mica gold. Parts of my life developed in tandem, and I socially transitioned while developing my public-facing watercolor-and-ink practice.

Art also allows me to be better understood, to share experiences I’ve had with friends and fam back home, and to channel received love and appreciation and hope back out in a meaningful way.

I love painting. It brings me such joy to put everything I’ve got into these pieces, which is what I’ve always wanted from the pursuit I dedicate my life to. I’m grateful to have found it, and I hope these paintings and designs convey to you the joy and love and energy they intend.

My wife and best friend, Ali, has been incredibly supportive of this journey for decades. None of this would be possible without her. The poppies I paint are based on ones she planted in our backyard, which fills with a vibrant, unbounded display each spring.

—Kei

About the Artist & Studio Kei

Kei Weaver (they/them) is a trans-femme nonbinary artist based in Petaluma, CA. Their primary materials are watercolor paints (often with mica mixed in) and ink pens (most especially Japanese brush pens and multiliners). Kei’s fine-art practice focuses on the California poppy, while the larger Studio Kei brand produces Sonoma County-minded lifestyle and decor products, including archival giclée prints produced in-studio in Petaluma, miniature framed originals (“minis”), glassware, and greeting cards.

Currently, Kei balances their studio practice with working part-time as a technical writing and editing consultant. Their work here is mostly focused on renewable energy and industrial decarbonization, helping to shape, craft, and polish large-scale publications. They most recently served as co-author of an industrial roadmap of the semiconductor industry for the U.S. Department of Energy. 

Kei earned their B.S. in physics from Carnegie Mellon University, M.S. in physics from Cornell University (thesis advisor: Dr. Richard Galik), and MFA in creative writing from the University of Maryland - College Park (thesis advisor: Maud Casey). They participated in summer research programs at MIT in Boston and CERN in Geneva, Switzerland, and the playful visual language of particle physics and electrodynamics underpins much of Studio Kei's design principles.

Under their given name “Ken”, Kei was one of the leading U.S. beer writers for about a decade. They published The Northern California Craft Beer Guide with their wife Ali Schmidt through local Petaluma publisher Cameron + Company. Kei worked as beer editor at All About Beer Magazine, was a 5-time judge at the Great American Beer Festival in Denver, and is a co-founder of the Petaluma River Craft Beer Festival.