Kirsten Sims (b. 1987) is a visual artist based in Cape Town, South Africa. She works predominantly as a painter and illustrator. Kirsten completed a BA in Applied Design at the Stellenbosch Academy (2011) and completed her Honours degree in Illustration at Stellenbosch University (2014). Kirsten’s philosophy in life and art is “one thing leads to another”. Her own path has led to editorial and commercial illustration projects for the likes of The New Yorker, Airbnb, AD Magazine and Apartamento Magazine; solo exhibitions in Cape Town and Toronto; and inclusions in numerous art fairs and group exhibitions. The narrative quality of Kirsten’s work has also lent itself naturally to children’s storybook illustration. Orfeu Negro published her first picture book, Balthazar The Great, in 2015.

Through her painting Kirsten seeks connection; to communicate the way she sees and experiences the world and her place in it. The scenes Kirsten paints are often a self-aware and gentle parody of the lives people portray on social media. Taking a break from the hyper-connectedness of modern living, within a body of work Kirsten will swop the sartorial crowd for big open skies punctuated with an evening star or rolling clouds. She seamlessly replaces the theatre of human interaction with the drama of a natural landscape.