Joey Yu Will Lift Up Your Spirits

With digital detox and minimalism, in general, being a rising trend, we find ourselves searching for simplicity, beauty, and happiness. But draining our feeds from toxicity is one thing—filling it up again with some positivity and color is a whole other. And after spending the past year looking wistfully out of the window, boy we could use some color.

Lately we find ourselves gravitating towards Joey Yu’s Instagram page. An award-winning illustrator, animator, and curator, her Instagram is filled with creativity to the brim, providing us with color and inspiration. According to Yu, she soaks up inspiration from the world around her.

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Rearranging pre lockdown

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“I have a lot of different reference points,” she relayed in an interview with G-IRL, explaining she’s an avid collector of graphic imagery. “For example, I have this regular physics school book but the cover is so stylish and the way it feels is really lux.”

With almost 100,000 followers on Instagram alone and an impressive clientele list that includes publications and brands as big as The New York Times, Guardian, and Hermes, Yu has a lot going on for her. “I remember hearing a lot of people say that there wasn’t enough space for new illustrators,” she recalled. “A lot of the stuff I do is reportage style and I was talking to someone who said ‘You can’t make money from that’ but my experience says otherwise.”

Her tip to other aspiring creatives? If you work hard and you’re really diligent and persistent with what you do there will always be space for you. “At first, no-one was asking me to draw,” she reflects, “so I drew for myself. If people see what you’re doing, they pick up on your passion and a space will emerge for you. I’ve been really lucky.”

Follow her for some color, inspiration, and creative passion.

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My favourite 💒

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