Kazland

Some art stories begin with a child prodigy, or a moment of inspiration and others start with pneumonia… well, at least this one does for Callum J. Buckland, also known as Kazland. When looking at his work it’s not obvious how to describe it, “It always changes. I usually like to keep it as simple as possible… Surrealist landscape painter is the easiest. Especially when talking to relatives.”

However, if we were going to give it a go, Kazland’s work is deep and dark, full of emotion, sometimes funny, sometimes serene and peaceful and often worrying. Which are a lot of words that contradict each other and when put together don’t really paint a cohesive picture, but at the same time, it does a really good job at describing his work. 

Written by Creative Stories
09/12/2025

Photos and Cover image provided by Kazland

We came across Kazland on TikTok, which for all its haters has become the place where we discover a lot of artists. Most of Kazland’s videos are of him painting, no gimmicks, or trying to play up for the algorithm, just good, clean content. There’s something infatuating about watching a skilled person doing something they love. 

Anyway, pneumonia… “I was hospitalised with pneumonia at 21 [years old] and couldn’t work for a long while after. I started focusing on my art as a way to keep employed and sane.” Kazland explains. He’s been a professional artist for 14 years, “I was very lucky at the start of my career to work with a lot of musicians. Making album artwork, t-shirts, gig flyers etc. Which really helped spread my work around.” 

We are used to seeing Kazland painting from watching their videos, but where does the process start, “For the most part I like to just start and see where the piece goes. I have an internal library of repeating symbols and themes that I bring in to help retell the stories.” 

For a lot of artists, a blank page can be a difficult start, so beginning with a sketch or using a sketchbook can alleviate that stress, “every now and then I do have an idea first which is always the most difficult way to work for me. Knowing exactly what I want something to look like is the road to madness.” We completely understand, it sounds very mediative and mindful to let the imagination guide and be free with the art. 

The internal library and repeating symbols are evident from just glancing at his artwork. A lot of the work contains a house, “The houses have been a long running theme. I think it came from when I would draw any sort of dog/wolf they would often have a snoopy-esq doghouse somewhere in scene.” We feel there might be a deeper meaning to this, and wonder whether these are places Kazland has visited or would want to visit, whether that be in real life or his imagination, “I’d visit a happy one and avoid a sad one. For the obvious reasons.” 

Another recurring symbol in his recent work is cats, as cat people we love this, if anything there should be even more cats in all art… However, spoiler alert, this isn’t a story with an happy ending, “cats became more of a recurring thing when my cat Sammy Davis Jr unexpectedly passed away in 2023. I ended up making a whole book of drawings and writings while processing it. It’s strange how these things just take hold of you.” Losing a loved one is devastating; we also had a cat that unexpectedly passed, and there isn’t a day that goes by, where we don’t talk and think about her. Cats, or any pets, are magic and are a constant source of inspiration.

Kazland experience of pain doesn’t end there, this year he was hit by a car, he said the accident wasn’t too bad and that he’s “much better now, thank you. I’ll have a slightly bad shoulder for maybe forever. But that might just be getting hit by a car in your 30s?” Whilst recovering he had to work in a different way than usual and did a series of work on small panels, “The very kind people at Jacksons Art sent me a care package of my favourite supplies so I could set up a little sofa studio while I recovered. I became much more meticulous with what I was working on as I couldn’t just jump around onto something new so easily, which is what I had gotten used to.” This series of works was exhibited at the Anno Domini gallery.

We have this theory that art takes on new meaning and life when experienced by others, that an audience or an individual brings a piece of themselves to the art, so how does an artist want people to feel when seeing their art, “Honestly I’m happy for pretty much any feelings at all. It’s always very special when what I feel about a piece has translated properly and the viewer feels it too. But it’s fine if they get something totally different.” Art is something personal, and we all have different emotions and reactions. Sometimes it’s unified, but we feel it’s more interesting when it’s not. “I made a new friend at my recent exhibition at George Gallery in Brighton and we just spoke about this one large piece of a green snake the entire time and it was mostly the colour that was giving her such a powerful reaction to the work.” 

Looking to the future what can we expect from Kazland, “[I’m] currently working on a new book! It’s a book of paintings and drawings that will highlight how my process happens. Or hopefully that’s how it’ll read anyway. And I’ve been making a lot of these small clay birds that I’m planning a fun exhibition for.” Kazland also let us in on what his dream project would be, “I’ve always wanted to have artistic control over a video game. But not have to do any of the animation or technical stuff. Just deliver a whole bunch of paintings, textures, drawings, and ideas. Let the smart people turn it into a weird indie game. One day!” 

As always, art and creativity is a special thing, it contains healing powers, whether you’ve been ill, had an accident, or lost a loved one, or you might have unfortunately experienced the hat-trick. With pain and heartache comes art, and hopefully that art can help others and yourself. 

Thanks to Callum for taking the time to answer our questions, as we always get the last word this time, we’ll hand it over to Kazland, “Be excellent to each other. Support small businesses. Drink water.” We couldn’t have said it better ourselves.

You can read the full interview here.

Check out Kazland across various sites:

https://kazland.co.uk | https://www.tiktok.com/@kazlandart | https://www.instagram.com/kazland