Illustrator & Black Lives Matter Everywhere Activist – Diana Ejaita

Meet the incredible Diana Ejaita, Berlin-based illustrator and textile designer. Her work focuses on womanhood, social, racial, and gender equality.

What sets her illustrations apart from a combination of dramatically contrasting areas of black and white with patterns and textures that create images of the strength of femininity.

Born in Cremona, Italy and of African-Nigerian origins, her aesthetic pays homage to her lineage. Nsibidi system of symbols and ideograms indigenous to southeast Nigeria. The symbols were once taught in schools and many deal with love, warfare and sacred spirituality.

Her fascination with Yoruba masks and Urhobo textiles is therefore a constant and fertile source for her textiles, silk screening, illustrations and wood engraving. Her work is an impressive collection of expressive illustrations employing the aesthetics of traditional African sculpture.

Ejaita is also the founder of Wear Your Mask, a brand that uses a silkscreen to mix African textile and patterns with minimalistic silhouettes to create “a unique style where cold and warm expressionism meet each other.” She said.

A fine arts graduate, Ejaita has been traveling, studying and living in different European countries since 2004.

I couldn’t live without art. Everyone has their own way of expressing themselves – some people are good speakers, some are very expressive with the body and are great dancers, others are talented with music and so on. Visceral art is my much-needed method of self-expression – it’s a source of life and at the same time it’s a cure, my own essential way of working through issues and understanding the world. -AYOK’A

View her entire portfolio here and support this insanely talented Femmie.

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