Lead Artist - Art Director

About the Role

We are seeking a highly experienced Lead Artist / Art Director to define, lead, and execute the visual direction for our next-generation mobile game. This role is focused on 3D stylized Western cartoon art, with ownership over the full game art pipeline across internal teams and external art vendors.

You will be responsible for establishing a clear, appealing, and production-ready visual language that directly supports gameplay. We are looking for someone who deeply understands game art not only as visual decoration, but as a core design tool: using shape, color, motion, readability, camera, UI, VFX, and environmental cues to help players immediately understand what to do, what matters, and what feels satisfying.

This role requires both strong artistic judgment and practical production leadership. You will guide characters, environments, props, animation, VFX, UI art, lighting, and overall visual presentation while building efficient workflows for a fast-moving game team. You will also actively explore and implement AI-assisted art production methods, helping us create an AI-native art pipeline for modern game development.

Responsibilities

• Define and drive the overall art direction and visual identity for a 3D stylized Western cartoon mobile game.

• Lead the creation of high-quality characters, environments, props, UI, VFX, animation, and lighting that enhance gameplay clarity and player experience.

• Establish art standards, style guides, production pipelines, and quality benchmarks across internal teams and external vendors.

• Collaborate closely with design, engineering, product, and technical art teams to deliver polished, scalable, and performance-optimized visuals.

• Manage outsourcing partners and ensure consistent quality, efficient workflows, and timely asset delivery.

• Oversee asset integration and optimization for mobile platforms, balancing visual fidelity with technical performance.

• Champion AI-assisted art workflows to accelerate concepting, production, and pipeline efficiency while maintaining artistic quality.

Requirements

• 6+ years of professional game art experience, including 2+ years in a Lead Artist, Art Director, or equivalent leadership role.

• Strong portfolio demonstrating high-quality 3D stylized game art, preferably with Western cartoon aesthetics.

• Proven experience leading multi-discipline art teams and managing external art vendors through the full production pipeline.

• Strong understanding of game art principles, including visual hierarchy, readability, color, composition, animation, UI, VFX, and gameplay communication.

• Hands-on knowledge of 3D art production, real-time engines (Unity, Unreal, or equivalent), and mobile game optimization.

• Excellent leadership, communication, and feedback skills, with the ability to collaborate across design, engineering, product, and technical art teams.

• Experience shipping or operating live-service mobile games is highly desirable.

• Passion for game art innovation, including the use of AI-assisted tools to improve production workflows and creative iteration.