Meet the Background Artist Behind Canadian Animated Shows | Art Nerd Spotlight

Kelsey McDougall is a former art student at Winged Canvas who now works on children's shows seen on CBC and Hulu. This month, we’re spotlighting her inspiring journey to becoming a professional background artist and achieving her dream of working in the animation industry.

Jump ahead:

• Being a Professional Background Artist in Animation

• Studying Art at UBC, Seneca, and Winged Canvas

• The Learning Never Stops For a Working Artist

• Returning to Teach at Winged Canvas as a Guest Artist

Being a Professional Background Artist in Animation

Kelsey is a Toronto-based background painter at Brown Bag Films, an award-winning Canadian-owned animation studio. Her work can be seen in recent animated series, including Super Why’s Comic Book Adventures, Dylan’s Playtime Adventures, and Open Season: Call of Nature.

Before that, she was a new grad who landed a job as a background artist on season 3 of Animaniacs at Titmouse, an award-winning American indie studio.

The following year, she became lead background artist for Hulu's “Animaniacs x MasterClass” shorts and “Looney Tunes: Acme Fools” shorts, where she designed and painted backgrounds. Outside of animation, Kelsey also took on freelance illustration for independent clients.

Studying Art at UBC, Seneca, and Winged Canvas

During her first year in the Media Studies program at the University of British Columbia (UBC), Kelsey took many fine art courses and built up her conceptual skills. To hone in on her technical art skills, Kelsey took up Art Mentorship classes with Fei Lu at Winged Canvas, where she learned figure drawing and painting.

"Through Fei’s mentorship, I began to grasp the fundamentals that I would later continue building upon in College, and throughout my career in animation," said Kelsey.

Drawing faces was one of Kelsey's biggest challenges. She found it difficult to capture likeness and values. "When I began drawing, I quickly became proficient in copying from photographs," Kelsey said, "but Fei taught me how to draw and paint from life, breaking down complex forms into their most basic parts."

At Winged Canvas, Kelsey learned essential art fundamentals that set the foundation for her more stylized approach today. Kelsey was able to improve her techniques after Fei taught her how to see instead of just copying!

Most importantly, Kelsey learned the importance of being open to finding your flaws as an artist and working on them. It’s a vulnerable and emotional journey that requires courage, but to truly grow as an artist, she realized you had to let go of your ego! It wasn’t easy, but it helped to be surrounded by fellow art nerds who shared similar interests.

"I am so glad that I found Fei and Winged Canvas at the beginning of my artistic journey back in 2015," Kelsey said. "Through Fei’s foundational teachings, I was able to learn the building blocks every artist needs to eventually turn a passion into a career!"

💡 The secret to improving your art? Lose your ego! We’ve all felt that gut-wrenching feeling when your art teacher gives you a long list of feedback that sends us all the way back to the drawing board. Art critiques are not easy to hear, but being open to feedback from professionals is how you find out what changes need to be made to improve your work.

After completing her 4-year undergrad degree at UBC—loads of character development, new friendships, growing thicker skin from art critiques, and many essays later—Kelsey continued on her journey to become a background artist and work in animation. 

She continued building on her fine arts education in Independent Illustration at Seneca College, a 1.5-year diploma program, where she specialized in children’s book illustration and won Best Traditional Media at Seneca’s 16th Graduate Showcase.

Her grad portfolio focused on traditional, gouache, and watercolour works related to children’s books—fitting with her current work in children’s animation.

The Learning Never Stops For a Working Artist

Even after achieving her dream of working in the animation industry, Kelsey continues to learn and improve her art skills by taking online classes and creating personal art. She also looks at other professionals working in roles she’s interested in to find the gaps, identifying the skills needed to get herself to where they are.

💡 Learning doesn’t stop after graduating from art school or landing your first job! While on the job, you’ll often find yourself looking to upskill to stay competitive and keep growing as an artist. Enrolling in online courses or virtual art classes is a flexible way to continue learning.

💡 If you like the art style in an animated movie, anime, comic, or video game, doing a style study can help you figure out how the artist achieved a certain look. You can use this as a reference for developing your personal art style.

Check out Kelsey's professional and personal artwork on her website or @kelseyannemcdougall on Instagram.

Returning to Teach at Winged Canvas as a Guest Artist

This past month, we’ve been chatting with Kelsey to plan some exciting things for our Art Nerd community. We’re excited to welcome her back to Winged Canvas as the first guest to kick off our new Professional Artist Guest livestream series on our YouTube channel in August 2025.

During the stream, you’ll get to hear more about her day-to-day life as an artist and all about her art journey from Kelsey herself, with a chance to ask your burning questions in the live chat!

More good news for aspiring artists who are interested in learning from a professional in the animation industry: Kelsey will be teaching a background painting workshop at Winged Canvas soon! Join our Discord community to be the first to hear the details.