Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Katherine “Kae” McSpadden. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Alright, Katherine “Kae” thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. When did you first know you wanted to pursue a creative/artistic path professionally?

Since I was six or seven. I started by tracing in my coloring books and creating new outfits for Disney princesses and eventually, I began to trying to draw various cartoon characters freehand. The first character that I was able to draw well without tracing was DeeDee from Dexter’s Laboratory when I was seven years old. Throughout my school years attending the International School of Luxembourg, I learned about various traditional art styles from various countries such as decorating pyansky eggs, origami, henna tattoos, and many more. I wanted to be an artist of many skills and can adapt to many styles. We moved back to the United States when I was 9, where I was able to impress my classmates with my art skills. Art has always been a big part of my family, my great-great grandfather, Gustave Flasschoen, was a well known Belgian painter and my dad’s cousin is an artist.

It was when I was 10 years old when I became obsessed with the animated series “The Simpsons.” This show was huge because not only did it get me into cartooning, but also I wanted to become a voice actor. Fascinated by the actors’ adaptability and versatility and being able to play dozens of characters, particularly with the talents of Dan Castellaneta, Nancy Cartwright, Hank Azaria, Harry Shearer, Phil Hartman, and Tress MacNeille. My primary focus was in art, but I would occasionally take an acting class or two throughout my school years to help with my animation and character acting skills. I didn’t really pursue acting as much due to the competitiveness of the field, but I still had the acting bug. It was not until Bang Zoom held on of their Adventures in Voice Acting classes in Chicago, when I finally decided to pursue the voice acting field. Taking the intermediate and advanced classes taught by Tony Oliver, the English voice of Lupin III, and diving head first into the VO world.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.

I am an artist specializing in character design, fantasy art, and illustration and I also work in the acting field as a voice over actress. For my art, I have participated in many art shows at Two Brothers Roundhouse in Aurora, Illinois before I moved to LA, and I have entered many contests, where I was one of the winners of the art installation sponsorship for the music festival Electric Forest and was a two-time finalist in the Design a Dance costume design contest for the show “Dancing With The Stars.” Some of the challenges of this field is figuring out what the client is looking for or trying to come up with a design that is close to what they envision. Or when designing concept art, I have to make sure all of the details are there so the animators know how to properly draw the character and how they look when they express different emotions. Even though I am versatile as an artist, it can be challenging to draw in a style I am not used to. I would have to practice drawing it in the style just to get the hang of it.

As a voice over actress for over five years, I have performed in various media including animation, live action dubbing, video games, narration, and commercials. I was one of the four students from Exceptional Minds who got the opportunity to voice characters in the English dub of the Israeli show “On The Spectrum” on HBO Max, I voiced one of the Prinnies in the game “Prinny 1 & 2: Exploded and Reloaded, voiced multiple characters in the audio dramas “Wrath of the Forgotten” and “Voyage of the Great Navigators,” some indie games including “Sorceress and Demons” and “Clunky Hero,” and I will be making my voice acting debut for a ride for the upcoming indie dark ride “Kooky Trails.” Sometimes voice acting can be tough because only one lucky person can get the job, it took me a long time to be able to accept that rejection gracefully. Voice acting can be physically draining too since I can be recording for long periods of time and I need to be careful not to strain my voice because it can damage it. I am so proud that I am able to voice a wide variety of characters and explore various characters, and getting to know many incredible actors who always look out for each other.

It has been difficult in both fields due to their competitiveness. With the strikes going on, it makes it much more difficult. Making me turn more towards indie projects and the gaming industry to find work. Which I am very open to since video games are also a big influence on me in both art and acting.

What’s a lesson you had to unlearn and what’s the backstory?

I often used how to draw manga books to help me draw faces and bodies, but eventually I had to stop using those books for help once my skills got better and better. They were a good jumping off point, but eventually I had to stop using those methods because it was causing all of my characters to look similar and limited my skills in terms of designing characters.

Is there a particular goal or mission driving your creative journey?

I would like to be able to make a living as an artist and voice actress, being able to afford my own place and have my own art studio where I can create any kind of art. I want to also adapt my story that I created when I was 14 into an action adventure video game series in the style of Uncharted, Jak and Dexter, and Beyond Good and Evil. In addition, I would like to be able to write and direct my own stories into films and series and make a series of art books that showcases my illustrations.

Contact Info:

• Website: katemcspaddenart.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/artbykaemcspadden/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/katherine-mcspadden/
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/KaeMcSpadden
• Other: voice acting site – kaemcspaddenVO.com

Image Credits
All artwork is owned by me and are my original works. The image of the four characters belong to their rightful owners (from top left going clockwise: Buddy, Flora, and Carala from Kooky Trails belong to Albert Rodreguez, Vaxena from Clunky Hero belongs to Chaosmonger Studio, Prinny from the Disgaea series belongs to Nippon Ichi, and The Cavity Queen belongs to me and Exceptional Minds)