Lily Kong

0:06 Hi I am lily kong I am an illustrator based in london I was originally from hong kong and now I work and live here today. I am going to introduce you to my illustration practice so there are two main things happening a I make commentaries with illustrations they are a bit like memes I really enjoy making fun of myself and things around me the other thing that I do is that I like illustrating nice things from nature I capture the joyful happy moments from our daily lives and I also love painting beautiful sceneries and landscapes from home.

0:53 So I work a day-to-day job on commercial projects like editorial illustrations for season for change that I did last year I also designed a few window displays for a japanese retail company called circo cebu last year no it's this year in tokyo sometimes I work on collaborations with brands like castanello from south korea and together we made a series of t-shirts socks and some very tiny bags so instead of showing you my portfolio today. I am going to share with you how humor plays a big part in my practice this is my cat pudding she actually does not give a about her weight but this snap was the perfect example of the kind of humor that I'm working on it shows the things that aren't really meant to be there it's kind of silly but I love it now as an illustrator and as a human my my major skill is to take the piss out of myself and my friends and strangers on the street what could have been an unsatisfying personality trait or enough setting events can actually be seen in a completely different way.

2:15 And if I take the piss out of myself it would make everything seem lighter and it will make me feel better I think the beauty of humor is that it breaks our expectations to assassin premises if you are in a dumb relationship making fun of it may make you feel a bit better and on some level it relieves the pain the loneliness the stress now here is how I do it my method consists of two parts a a set up to establish the premise and the punchline that breaks the audience expectations for example in this comic that I did for nice that last year no two years ago I keep getting it wrong I kept illustrating a happy morning as a setup until bam there's this bummer who hates mornings and the f word is the punchline I mean this stuff is just boring analytical things I prepared for this ted talk but to be honest you probably don't need to know the rules to be funny everyone has it naturally and the point is to channel your humor through some kind of a media and find out what really inspires you and what you're really interested in and on my way to finding inspirations one of them is using myself as a character I have never been the best verbal communicator illustrations offers achieved so I don't need to be I don't need to look at anyone in the eyes and having said that I am hugely inspired by how nervous I am as a human I think I'm a very very serious person. And I love the awkward silence between people now a side story about this illustration originally I made this work thinking literally being sorry for creating waste but as I posted on instagram people started tagging their ex and they apologized to them isn't it crazy how the work that is made about myself or myself can be relatable to others in a in this way.

4:47 Now if you have followed my work or if you see my work somewhere you probably know that I do a lot of stuff about the earth and the environment I think illustration and humor are a great combo to introduce anyone to a dense serious heavy topic and anything seems a little more approachable when you can have a laugh reading it and even if it is in a serious public protest from time to time I feel the need to step out of my comfort zone and find more inspirations I would ask for input from strangers on the internets and I get a lot of different responses that are both interesting and kind of spooky for example earlier this year I asked people to send me emoji combinations and they are kind of funny and I really trying to make it funnier by you know relinking the emojis together I ended up doing something that I wouldn't normally do which I love there was also a time where I'm curious about insults without swear words there are a lot of different ones from from different cultures and different references and I think it's pretty amazing that something as simple as you or you chicken can be as powerful as your typical go-to swear word do you recognize this from gordon ramsay I ended up making over a hundred iterations and here's my favorite your shoe I'm always interested in loneliness as a theme I find it fascinating that as I grew up and became an adult I feel more and more lonely even though I'm always with my friends and family and since 2019 loneliness has become significant in our lives I was heavily inspired by the events that trigger loneliness and the words that describe the feelings and there's loneliness between couples and also between you and your cat now taking the piss out of my daily life has been my way to ease the pain from feeling lonely and vulnerable and during the pandemic I kept getting messages from strangers on the internet again that they felt better after reading my work.

7:23 So then. I thought why not involve them in the process and share the empathy and that is why earlier this year in march I started a project called I'm fine and basically I asked the participants to send me their stories that triggered loneliness and then I will draw them on a postcard and each participant will receive one of the postcards as an exchange in this way they are not only interacting with me. But also with strangers and here are some examples this one is about the passing of a beloved hamster and at the back of this card there's a story.

8:08 But I'm gonna read it out loud at the start of the year I had to put my hamster down he brought so much joy and cuteness into my life now sometimes I sit on the sofa and I can hear his ghost wrestling the cage cheering the bars and sniffing around he had left a big hamster shaped a hole in my heart.

8:30 And I miss him dearly here's another one I'm with my friends and they talk about arts and I don't understand the lingo so I sit and nod and hope they won't notice that I'm a ball of anxiety I'm fine when creating these postcards I avoid illustrating the events themselves I often approach the stories by taking only a part or a prop from it I reimagine what could have happened if things were taken slightly out of context it's a bit like creating a sequel from a tv series and this approach often changes the narrative and the focus of the narrative obviously and it is making a joke but it is not making fun of others pain now in this project I also asked the participants to always end the stories with the phrase I'm fine I love this phrase it is full of denial and full of self-affirmation it suggests closure and the acts as a reminder to these people that they want to believe that they are going to be fine now I hope you find some humor in your lonely days too if not feel free to send me a story the end [Applause]