We have encountered many memorable illustrations of our favorite places in Berlin. Of our go-to clubs, our favorite freaky Berlin people and Berlin’s eclectic nightlife, but we have never seen an illustrator capturing the mental showdown of it all. The meta-level of what is playing out in our minds, when we go party in all of these places, with all those weird-ass freaky people we love so much, living it all up under one sweaty roof. That’s why we were in awe, laying eyes upon Virginie Kypriotis epic depiction of Berlins nightlife for the first time. Her ability to fuse her gift of illustrating with her sensitivity to special situations creates a whole new level of nightlife illustrations that we are excited to share with you.
„To me Berlins nightlife intensity is like nowhere else. It brings so many different people of all ages, of different cultures and different sexuality together, with a common passion for electro music. Berlin is a place of intense freedom which I think is pretty rare to find in other cities nowadays…“
Virginie grew up in France and first came to Berlin in 2006, when she fell in love with the city, moved here in 2007 and has been going back and forth both worlds ever since. She started her career as a character designer and art director in the animation industry, working with a team to give life to stories on screen, before diving deeper into her love for illustrating and creating a new path for herself. Building a career in illustration, she still co-writes and designs animated TV shows for kids and adults. In her illustrations Virginie subtracts everyday moments from her life and places them into a slightly surrealistic world. Her trademark style is often accompanied by busy images, with lots of odd characters (that we have all met and maybe even have been) and various stories coming together, leaving the viewer with many details to discover.
Embracing Berlins multi-facetted nightlife is what sparked her inspiration on her recent illustrations. As many of us know, working as a freelancer can be a lonely affair. Virginie treasures her nights as moments to socialize, meet new people and reconnect with friends. These moments are where her artwork is born.
„Parties & techno culture is getting more and more important in my work, because I think it is underrepresented in art. I consider nightlife as an essential side of the society.“
Even though Berghain is her club of choice, Virginie is currently working on many more illustrations, that depict other big clubs and her experiences there. If you love her work as much as we do, follow her Instagram for updates and new Berlin-themed illustrations! Next time go you out, you might not even realize you met her and maybe you are lucky enough to end up as one piece of the story in her next epic nightlife artwork.
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