#kiakili

[yasbxxgie]

"Branding” Prints

[goodfortunesapparel]

Kiakili Interview: #GoodFortunesFridays

 The term black excellence is thrown around quite frequently on most of my social media feeds. Whether it be my friend wearing a dapper suit to prom with the hashtag #BlackExcellence to a photo of someone graduating with that same hashtag in the caption, “black excellence” has become a buzzword of sorts. While I am a proud minority (viva Colombia) I am not black so it’s not my place to say what or what isn’t “black excellence”, but I bring this term up for a reason. As soon as I saw the artwork of 19 year old Kiakili, this term immediately popped up into my head. If you scroll down his Instagram profile I promise you’ll feel the same. A gallery of masterfully drawn illustrations depicting everything from portraits of musicians like Chance The Rapper and Joey Bada$$ (peep his alternative cover for Chance’s new mixtape, it’s what got us hooked) to illustrations charged with sociopolitical messages about police brutality and racial inequality, it’s obvious he has something to say. Regardless of your opinion of the topics dealt with in his projects, any artist using his talents to educate and start a conversation is immensely praiseworthy in of itself. The topic of racial inequality has been brought to the forefront of pop culture in recent years, and whether it be the increased media coverage of incidents of police brutality to a simple twitter hashtag like #OscarsSoWhite, these controversial topics are everywhere. Despite this, many choose to ignore the rather uncomfortable conversation that is racial inequality, but not Kia.. He has chosen to dive in head first and voice his opinions on these topics that affect everyone around us, whether or not we’d like to admit it. This to me is the embodiment of #BlackExcellence, for Kia is using his talents to not push a certain mentality on people but rather inspire anyone to think about these issues. Ultimately his voice and brilliance could be seen as small steps towards diminishing racial inequalities, or at least acknowledging the problem. Whether you agree with Hamilton’s views or you just appreciate good artwork, we caught up with him to talk more in-depth about his creative process, inspirations, and plans for the future.

Good Fortunes: Who are you?


Kiakili: I go by the alias “Kiakili”. I am 19 years of age and I attend the Ivy League University of Pennsylvania.

Good Fortunes: How exactly did you become interested in artwork and actually start creating things? Kiakili:   I got more interested into art by the motivation of my mom combined with my love for cartoons. I used to sit in front of my TV with a pencil and paper ready to draw whatever was coming onto the screen, whether it was Spongebob or Dragonball Z. I would just practice every day until I could draw what I wanted perfectly.

Good Fortunes: So cartoons and cereal.. at what moment did you realize you really loved art? Kiakili: I’ve loved art since I was about four years old. My mom was the one to notice it before me actually. I started kindergarten a year early, and to do so I had to go through tests to prove that I was a proper fit to go without pre-schooling. In that test I had to learn to count and to write my own name and stuff like that, and one portion of it had me coloring in a picture and I had drawn a self-portrait (as in pre-school, my teacher said I would draw people without necks). And so, I was never one to draw stick figures: it was always full-bodied figures with depth and my mom acknowledged it.

Good Fortunes: How would you describe your art style now? Kiakili: I work primarily in a digital format now, using software such as PaintTool SAI, Photoshop, and Illustrator as my tools. I started off as most artists in pencil and I eventually adapted to acrylic where I painted many portraits. However, digital illustration on my graphic tablet (Wacom Cintiq) has been much easier for me. My anxiety of messing up and having to start over has always drifted me away from traditional coloring methods, so the presence of an “Undo” function is all I needed to know that this would be my main method of making art. For years I have yet to hone a noticeable style as other artists have, but now I believe my more “blocky/cut-out” style that I have recently been using for my more socio-politically aware pieces is turning what will be my artistic identity.

Good Fortunes: We noticed your artwork on your Instagram has a lot of sociopolitical messages. What statement are you trying to make through pieces like this? Kiakili: My primary goal is to make people think and to start necessary conversations surrounding these issues. I’m not trying to push an agenda—I make sure to include almost every angle in my pictures so that I don’t—I’m only pushing people to think. I believe art can be powerful in that way. People are losing attention spans in reading in this age of overhauled, shorthanded information. Visual interpretations don’t require reading nor long attention spans, and through this medium of social media, I believe I can take advantage of that with art. I’ve always been an activist for free thought and justice, and I am enabling this with my artwork. If I’ve made someone think about what’s going on the world, I feel accomplished. And I’m always improving and branching into other areas, so I just wish for everyone to stick with me and we can fix these issues together democratically while spreading positivity. That’s what I live by and it’s what I love.

Good Fortunes: How would you describe your creative process? Kiakili: My creative process is really spontaneous. I get ideas out of the blue, write them down, then put all of the ideas in my head onto the screen. When I’m stuck, I usually have to take a break which can be from an hour to a couple of days until I get the energy to come back to the drawing, or I ask fellow friends or artists for suggestions. My best ideas happen on the spot; there are little changes that I’ve made to drawings that have really made all the difference in how people perceive the art. Sometimes when I listen to a song, I try to visually depict the ideas while throwing some of my own flavor onto it. Sometimes I have to ask for feedback on how something should look before I post it online—my more controversial pieces especially need review because I don’t want to garner negative press for something that can be potentially offensive.

Good Fortunes: What do you usually listen to while working on projects? Kiakili: I usually listen to new albums when I’m working on projects. It’s kinda like killing two birds with one stone.

Good Fortunes:  Any favorites? Kiakili:   I listen to so much music, I really can’t decide upon a single song haha. When I was younger I used to be all about Nas and “You’re Da Man” was my favorite track of his. But having branched my music library, I really have so much music to make a proper decision. If I really had to it would be The Heart Pt. 3 by Kendrick. He kills it and I can’t ever get tired of it. But Kanye is probably my favorite artist with my most favorite albums. My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy is top 5 rap albums for me.

Good Fortunes: What inspires you? Who would you say are the biggest influences on your work?

Kiakili: My influences begin with Akira Toriyama, the creator of Dragon Ball. Dragon Ball and Dragonball Z were my favorite shows growing up and it really began my interest into anime and manga styles. Furthermore, my biggest influence may be Aaron McGruder, creator of the Boondocks. I used to read the comic strip all the time, and the TV show is my favorite cartoon of all time. A lot of what the show represents in black culture and American satire is present in my artwork. Aside from visual-based artists, I definitely am inspired by music artists such as Kanye West, Kendrick Lamar, and Chance the Rapper. Their music definitely has always made me feel something and relate to them, and they’ve definitely gotten me through some hard times and influenced themes of my artwork.

Good Fortunes: Favorite piece of yours? Kiakili:    I don’t know haha maybe my favorite piece is the “Pool Party” one with the drowning hand, the gun and the cell phone. At the time of this drawing, which was last year June, I was in the middle of a panic attack after having a horrible freshman year of college and just paranoid at my grades and internships. I was in a very dark and vulnerable point in my life. So when that happens, I usually draw, because that’s really what it feels like I have left. And so I made that piece, and all of a sudden it went super viral. Like it’s been shared millions of times now, not just Instagram but it reached Facebook and Tumblr where it grew even more. The response was overwhelming. It made me feel like I had worth again, after my education environment was constantly trying to convince me that I had none. That picture really means a lot to me in that regard y’know. It saved my life. It’s also my proudest moment. Everyone was talking about it. It made people think. It started arguments and conversations. That was my goal and it made me feel accomplished.

Good Fortunes: Do you see yourself always doing art in the future? Kiakili: When I have nothing, art is always there for me. I feel I can never give it up. I may pursue other fields, as I’m studying Information Systems and Economics in school right now. So I’m looking into corporate jobs and such, but this art stuff will never go away. If I find enough success in my artwork, there won’t be a need for the corporate job in the long run. But I won’t eliminate the possibility. We’ll see what happens.

Good Fortunes: What current projects are you working on at the moment? Kiakili: Currently I’m looking to designing more t-shirts and posters so that I actually can give my art physically, since a lot of my work has been digitally distributed for free. I’m currently backed up with loads of commissions as a result of the Chance 3 exposure, but I have a lot of optimism-based pictures to equal out the more serious artworks I’ve done recently.

Good Fortunes: What advice would you give to anyone out there who wants to start creating? Kiakili: Best advice I can give is to market yourself properly and be persistent. I see a lot of amazing artists out there who probably put a lot more time into their art than me, but barely anyone sees it because they haven’t done the work to put themselves out there. Reddit and Instagram are definitely your friends. You just have to do a lot of research and see what works and what doesn’t. And be persistent about that. I wouldn’t have gotten Chance to notice if I didn’t turn on notifications of his account, then as soon as he tweeted, be the first reply with the picture I drew of him. Then doing this over and over until I made sure he saw. I had a lot of support with it too. And I’m completely thankful for that. Now I don’t want anyone to spam links and such to a point where it’s annoying to your followers (to the point where SoundCloud links have become undesirable). Build your base slowly by garnering supporters from smaller accounts and work your way up. It’s all a marketing and management process.

You can’t help but feel inspired by Kiakili’s work ethic. Good Fortunes has always aimed to inspire creativity and individuality onto our customers and followers, and that’s exactly what Kiakili’s artwork has done to us. By continuing to post these interviews, releasing new merchandise and running this brand we hope we can inspire someone to try something new and  create something amazing (hopefully while wearing some Good Fortunes Apparel amiright?).