KJ

KJ (she/her) is a visual artist, illustrator and designer from Edinburgh, Scotland. KJ creates dynamic digital works with satisfying gradients and hazy colour palettes. Since graduating from a BA in Illustration from Edinburgh College of Art in 2020, KJ has launched herself into a freelance career. From editorial illustrations to site specific murals, KJ has worked with a wide range of clients such as The Atlantic Magazine, MIT Press, Scran, The University of Edinburgh and has recently launched her Instagram comic; Cloud9.0. Her main focus is to champion bold and authentic characters and create a platform for self expression without judgement.

Cloud9.0

Cloud9.0 is a speculative Instagram comic where a girl finds herself in a utopian world in the clouds. Cloud9.0 is Solarpunk; an emerging art movement that envisions how the future might look if major contemporary challenges were solved, such as climate change and social justice. The comic encapsulates many themes from fashion to mental health wrapped up in some Instagram-friendly weirdness with each weekly comic.

As our present reality moves eerily towards the plot lines of dystopian science fiction, the emerging sci-fi genre of Solarpunk can offer some much-needed escapism and raise interesting questions about the society we live in today. Solarpunk explores the unity between human existence and nature, and envisions a free, egalitarian world. It embraces low tech ways of living such as gardening, repurposing and thrifting, contrasted with high tech solutions like solar panels, solar flowers and portals.

The heart of Cloud9.0 is about self-discovery and respect; if we respected ourselves, others, animals, nature, what would our society look like? If we overcame all these major obstacles in life, what’s left? What does respect (to ourselves, to others, to the planet, to the earth) look like?

To view more of KJ’s work please visit her website.