AUG 26TH, 2022
Each week 100 NFTs are minted and randomly airdropped to UNDRGRND Membership Cardholders. To find out how you can be featured as an UNDRGRND Artist check out our Discord.
The beautiful darkness engulfs us all from time to time.
Any recovering emo-kid from the late aughts can see the allure of Holy Empress Kira’s work. Outsiders were often surprised to find the self-identified “emo” to be quite happy and upbeat. To the outside world darkness is ugly, depressing, unsafe. To others there is relief, kindness and compassion.
“I want people to see dark art in a new light,” Kira says, “something that can be dreamy, elegant and comforting rather than only macabre.”
Kira illustrates with a softness to her work. The characters are often depicted in moments of compassion. The lighting is always soft while shadows obscure details of them, never revealing the complete image. The moments she captures are often quiet and personal. Moments shared between two people that only they understand or would know. Kira only reveals what she chooses which matches her personality.
“I am a very reserved person in real life” she says, “so the only way one could know my thoughts is through my artworks.”
A concept difficult to remove from her artwork is the idea of revealing what is safe for others to see. Much of her characters are shrouded in mystery and shadow. We are allowed a window into those moments, not an entire doorway.
There is protection under darkness. Protection from the outside world of hurt. A world where trust is needed we show what we are comfortable to let into the light. And when they are brought into the light, there is exquisite detail that shimmers.
Sunday
The Meet Up
Sweet Dreams
Authoress In Solitude
How many times has anyone found themselves in despair or gravitated to the comfort in the cover of darkness? It is not until we understand the contrast between dark and light that we fully grasp the beauty in pain or hurt. And only then do you start to see that the edges of darkness and light are blurred and never so easily defined, just as it is in Holy Empress Kira’s work.
