Bio & Rationale
Kate Loveday’s illustration ‘The Weatherman Didn’t Predict This’ was inspired by a surreal cloud formation seen while walking in a Perth dog park. Ominous and shapeshifting, the storm mass loomed large, sparking an immediate need to capture it. The finished drawing balances whimsy with dread, suggesting both the beauty and the strangeness of the natural world. Like the best of speculative art, it invites viewers to wonder what might lie just out of sight.
Based in Perth and often working under the name Kel Sticks, Kate is an illustrator with a penchant for blending natural imagery with hints of the supernatural. Their work often treads a line between everyday observation and otherworldly reimagining, resulting in pieces that feel both accessible and uncanny. Their influences range from pop-culture conventions to raw encounters with landscapes, creating a practice that feels as much about storytelling as image-making.
For Aether, Kate’s artwork was chosen for our limited-release Hazy IPA. Just as the beer was layered, juicy, and mysterious in the glass, their illustration captured that same enigmatic beauty on the can. Together, beer and art formed a pairing that was hazy in all the best ways – complex, pretty, and impossible to ignore.
