An artist who spent two months turning 7,000 hand-made plastic cats into a portrait of Taylor Swift now creates artwork for celebrities - with his most expensive artwork selling for $300,000.





Kevin Champeny, 50, has been a mosaic artist professionally for the last nine years and has been commissioned to make artwork for celebs include Mike Tyson, Lionel Messi and Troy Sivan.



Combining his love of drawing, painting and sculpture, Kevin fell in love with mosaics - a visual artform where an image is created using small parts.

Rather than using traditional materials - like glass or stone - Kevin opts to hand-cast the pieces for his mosaics - which is plastic hand poured into molds.

The result produces small, to scale models like cats, handbags, bears or pills - which are slotted together to created a larger image.

Kevin can spend anywhere between two months to a year creating his masterpieces - with every component sculpted by himself and hand assembled.





Clients pay anything from $5,000 and $300,000 for Kevin's work - depending on the complexity of the piece.





His most striking work includes is a gummy bear lamp, inspired by Nickelodeon's iCarly, made from more than 15,000 bears.





He also designed a Birkin bag portrait made from 3,500 mini hand-cast Birkin handbags and re-created Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa portrait using 15,000 hand-cast prescription pills.





Kevin, from Port Washington, New York, said: "I could draw before I could speak."





"I make a mix of custom work, bespoke items for galleries and things I've wanted to create since I was a kid."





"Trouble is, I keep adding to that list, so I think it'll be never-ending."





"I like to make pieces that evoke emotion, and for celebrity portraits, I like to normalise them."





"Take Taylor Swift, she's this global superstar, but she likes cats."





"That's why I chose to make her portrait out of cats - they're relatable."





"I love making custom orders because I can collaborate with someone I've never worked with and create something great."





"For Mike Tyson, I made him a portrait out of boxing gloves and for Messi, I made his out of soccer balls."





Despite a successful two and a half year career in the aerospace industry, Kevin always knew his passion was in the art world.





"I have never wanted to anything other than be an artist, it is my passion and my singular drive." Kevin said."





"Everything else I did was just to make a living."





In 2016, Kevin took a leap and pursued his art business full-time and since then has created over 39 portraits, nine personal commissions and 36 exhibitions in New York, Florida and Germany.





When asked his favourite general piece he's ever created, Kevin said: "It's got to be 'What Remains' which I created in 2018."





"It's a skull made out of 35,000 hand-cast flowers."





"It was my first sculpture where I used colour."





"It invites people to think about the essence of existence, memory, and the traces we leave behind."





"My brother has it in his home, so it's nice that I get to see it every now and then."





Kevin has posted videos showing how he makes his work on YouTube for years, and now on

TikTok, where he has over 1.2 million followers.





"I've been able to connect with people throughout the world through my art, and I love it."





"My recent Taylor Swift portrait has gotten nearly 1 million views."





"I'd like to think that Taylor herself has seen it and likes it."





"I listened to her whole catalogue of songs whilst working on her portrait."





"My favourite song of hers is Antihero."