Artist Spotlight: Cayla Zeek
September 9, 2015 | by Lyndsy Bradley
Having only just received her bachelor’s degree in visual arts from the University of Louisiana at Lafayette this spring, it’s extremely impressive — but not entirely surprising — that 23-year-old Lafayette native, Cayla Zeek, seems to be on the tip of everyone’s tongue when discussing artists to know in Lafayette’s local art scene and beyond.
The sublime pieces Cayla creates have earned her the Outstanding Student Award, Visual Arts Spark Award from UL Lafayette, as well as other scholarships and have been shown in group exhibitions including the Fresh Pickens’ Student Show hosted at the Acadiana Center for the Arts, and other galleries in Downtown Lafayette and the Breaux Bridge area.
Her most recent collection explores the human figure; inspired by mythology, alchemy, preconceived notions of gender — “as women around me and myself are objectified and given expectations of how we should act,” Cayla explains in her statement of influence — and of course birds, which are a recurring theme in her body of work.
Since graduating, Cayla has — like many creative post-graduate millennials dealing with the aftermath of an economic collapse — “been having an existential crisis nearly everyday. What am I going to do with my life? Am I stuck living in a small town and will I still be inspired to make great art?
“The answer is of course: Yes I am always going to make art, and, no, I am not stuck.”
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