"I am interested in politics, but most of all, I'm interested in the human story and how we all affect each other sharing this planet." In terms of her politics, Kiernan says she is interested in civil society. She would regularly call me when I'm on the train, which I'm sure caused more than a few missed stops for hooked commuters."
It's made for interesting eavesdropping at times. "Olivia writes crime fiction so that can lead to some pretty grisly conversations but she knows I'm not fearful to push boundaries when it comes to putting things on paper in a visual sense, so that works really well for us both. At times, when I'm sitting looking at a blank page, a chat about how some plot thread is causing a problem is exactly the ignition that's needed for both her and me. "We have always enjoyed sharing ideas and teasing things out when inspiration is lacking. Kiernan says it was healthy to have another creative so close. She would later go on to study classical animation at Ballyfermot Senior College.Īnn's younger sister, Olivia, is a novelist, whose most recent book, If Looks Could Kill, was released last summer. I became wholly absorbed back then and luckily when I draw and paint I still do." "I was always very sensory, so the smells and sounds of drawing were and are still part of the appeal for me - I think it's the same for a lot of artists. "And that had a satisfying crackling sound when it dried," she says. Kiernan loved making marks on paper, the smell of crayons in her hand or how paper "buckled" when it got wet with paint. On days when it was miserable and wet, she got lost in books or drawing. While Kiernan understands how social-media platforms can be a force for good, especially for movements such as Black Lives Matter, MeToo and Repeal the Eighth, she says that Twitter should be "separate from governmental influence and in regions like Middle East and North Africa, users should be afforded the same rules as Western users."īorn in March 1973, Kiernan grew up in the Kells countryside in Co Meath. The V&A judges described what Kiernan came up with as a "violent but beautiful image" and "an innovative interpretation of the well-known corporate logo." He suggested I try an image in the flowy ink style I work in and the result was Twitter Jail," says Ann. "So while he thought the Dead Tweet was not right, he still thought that the idea of a shot bird was the right way to go. "The article was a deep dive into Twitter censorship, so he didn't want a Twitter logo but it should be obvious the article was about the topic." "There was a definite direction he wanted to go with the image," she says. He wanted to show that censorship is an aggressive act. Kiernan read Eskandar's article in advance of starting her work on the illustration. The illustration accompanied an article by Wael Eskandar ('How Twitter is gagging Arabic users and acting as morality police') for independent media site Open Democracy. Her illustration, Twitter Jail (see page 18), won her the prestigious Moira Gemmill Illustrator of the Year and the V&A Illustrated Journalism Award 2020. It was another political prison, albeit a digital one, that recently brought the Kells-born artist international acclaim. While it's a historical tour into the past here in Berlin," she says, "it's a living reality in many places in the world." "They might have never found out the reason why. A person could be taken there in the dead of night, interrogated into a confession and a typical sentence could be between 15-25 years in very harsh conditions. So the population as a whole was under pretty constant psychological stress. "The structure as a whole in East Germany under Stasi rule worked on informants. The prison is a stark reminder of how oppressive systems work.
"You get a first-hand account of what prisoners experienced, because a lot of the tours are given by ex-inmates. When Kiernan moved to Berlin in 1994 to further her artistic ambitions and moved into the studio, the first thing she did was take a tour of the prison.
#Separation studio with illustrator series#
A portrait by Ann Kiernan, one of six illustrations for the Washington Post, for a series of articles to mark the second anniversary of the murder of exiled Saudi writer Jamal Khashoggi
0 kommentar(er)
