Ana Jaks Uses Queer Illustrations to Add Color to the World

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Ana Jaks Uses Queer Illustrations to Add Color to the World

Ana Jaks is an illustrator based in Bristol, U.K. Her work looks to be bright and colorful where many people in all shapes and sizes are represented. Jaks has worked on projects from editorial pieces to murals. Her business clients have included Facebook, Vice, Nike, Bombay Sapphire, John Lewis, and The Telegraph. Below is an artist's statement from Jaks describing her illustrations.

"I've always wanted to convey some sense of joy and celebration throughout my work; a sense of lightness and relief between everything else that's going on. Midway through my degree, after a series of university projects that felt like an ongoing collection of deeply sad representations of current affairs, I felt like the world - or maybe I - didn't need any more reminders of darkness. It's important for those things to be communicated, but I think I made a decision at that time, to be as colorful and bright and fun as possible.

Like lots of illustrators, this practice works as some form of escapism; creating worlds that are bright and colorful and full of all types of people who express themselves in the way that they want, and to interact with each other in the way we all wish, is just a dream.

Initially, my work was always very female-led, which presumably came from a desire to represent women as strong and powerful and a force to be reckoned with, in an industry that was previously male-dominated at the time of me entering the space. Eventually, that desire to represent one group of people turned into wanting to represent everyone who may have felt - or continues to feel - unseen, unheard, or as though they don't belong.

My queerness wasn't realized until part-way through my twenties, and I truly believe that the creation of these worlds I was illustrating, alongside an ongoing series of LGBTQIA+ projects from clients is what helped me start to understand who I am, and how I wanted to express myself as a person.

My approach to illustration - the combination of bright, colorful work with a love for illustrating all sorts of people..."

-Ana Jaks

Find out more about Jaks here.