Shua Copeland

Shua Copeland | Space Children

Your work often combines illustration and collage. How do you decide when a piece should be purely digital, hand-crafted, or a mix of both?

Honestly, it really just depends on what feels right at the moment. Some days, I’ll get lost on my iPad, sketching, illustrating just letting my mind wander and my hands follow. I could spend hours, even days, just creating whatever comes to me. No rules, no structure, just flow. But when I’m working with my hands building a collage piece or painting something physical it’s the same spirit, just a different rhythm. Sometimes those pieces take me weeks. I’ll sit with them, come back, change something, add a new layer. I don’t rush it unless I feel like I have to. For me, it’s all about speed and emotion, how fast the feeling hits and how  fast I need to get it out. Some things I hold and mold, others I let loose immediately. Either way, everything I make is a reflection of where I’m at, right then and there.

Many of your pieces explore the complexity of Black identity. What personal experiences most influence these themes in your art?

It really started with my childhood just being surrounded by everything Black. The culture, the energy, the way my family carried themselves all of that shaped me. From the aesthetics to the style, to the way we talk and move it was all so natural but powerful. That Black identity wasn’t something I had to search for, it was always right there, living around me. As I got older and started to tap into my own style and taste, I realized how much of that foundation I wanted to pour into my work. Whether I’m creating something light and playful or deep and layered, I want the spirit of where I come from to be felt. It’s important for me to keep that identity strong in my craft because that’s what makes it real. That’s what makes it mine.

Shua Copeland | Skywalkers

The gold grills and expressive lips appear across several of your works. What do these recurring motifs symbolize for you?

It symbolizes where I’m from down South, Atlanta, Georgia. That’s where I first saw grills, shining in the sunlight like gold trophies. And anybody from the South knows that’s our thing. It’s more than just jewelry, it’s a statement, a form of expression, a badge of pride. Grills tell you where somebody’s from without them having to say a word.

I’ve been sitting on some pieces that speak to that culture, and I still want to bring it all together into a full collection. I’m calling it “GRILLZ & GLORY”. I see it as a full installation of photography, collages, maybe even sound and video. I want to show the beauty, the story, and the shine behind it all. It’s Southern. It’s personal. And it’s powerful.

You’ve said that you create based on the question, “What would my 9-year-old self do?” — can you share a moment when that instinct shaped a specific piece?

It’s really every time I make a piece there’s not one specific work that defines it for me. I don’t overthink it. I just do. That’s how it’s always been. When I was around 9, I started experimenting with stuff, just trying things out. I was surrounded by music and art, and I was curious. I liked a lot of things at once drawing, sounds, textures so I kept creating from that place. Most of my pieces come from that same instinct. I move off energy. I don’t always sit down with a deep concept or plan, I just let it happen. But when I do want to tap into something more emotional or meaningful, I know how to sit with it and really build that feeling into the work. But at the core, it’s always been about the act of doing. Just letting it flow.

Shua Copeland | The Gold Grillz | 2024

Your art often feels deeply emotional, yet playful. How do you balance vulnerability with vibrancy?

This is probably one of my favorite questions to answer, for real. I’ll break it down like this. My vulnerability in art comes from the struggles I’ve been through and the silence I had to sit in during those trials. I’ve dealt with a lot internally, and instead of always talking about it, I try to let my work speak for me. So when I think of an artistic statement that shows up across a lot of my pieces it’s tears. I draw a lot of tears. Not always in a sad way, but because that image stays with me. It’s what comes to mind naturally, and to be honest, it just hits emotionally and aesthetically. It’s powerful, and it carries weight. Now on the flip side, the playfulness in my work comes from the joy I get in making faces literally. I love drawing different variations of faces, giving them attitude, expression, or just letting them be weird and wild. That inspiration comes from everywhere: old Adult Swim shows I used to watch, random things I see while out in the streets, or just straight out of my imagination. It’s like two sides of me living in the same body of work—one that feels deeply, and one that plays freely.

Do you feel collage, as a medium, reflects how memory and identity are formed — layered, messy, and nonlinear?

Yes, I do and that’s exactly why I started doing collages. It’s one of the only art forms where it feels like you can truly do whatever’s in your mind. You can pull from different places, create something wild, something raw, something that doesn’t even make sense at first but somehow, it still works. That freedom is what drew me in. And when people ask me, “Why collages?” I always tell ’em, because my brain is a collage. I’m layered. I got different moods, different thoughts, memories, dreams all stacked on top of each other. Sometimes I might seem all over the place, but if you take a step back and really look, I’m still put together. That’s what collages is to me. It’s messy and beautiful at the same time. Just like life.

Shua Copeland | Golds&Roses | 2024

Many of your works feature mirrored or duplicated portraits. What draws you to this compositional choice?

I just like doing multiple things at once. Sometimes, one portrait by itself doesn’t hit the same spot; it doesn’t give me enough room to say everything I want to say. I like layering, overlapping, bringing different elements together because that’s how my mind works. It really just depends on how the piece is coming together. Some ideas need more than one face, more than one energy. I build based on the feeling, the flow. If it calls for more, I give it more. Simple as that.