Introduce yourself
Hello! My name is Diana Pietrzyk and I’m an interdisciplinary Artist born and raised in Chicago. 🙂
When did you first start getting involved with art?
My journey into the art world began as soon as I could figure out how to use crayons I suppose. I remember coloring books and Crayola supplies were ALL I wanted from my parents. New books, fresh crayons, I was living. In High school, I initially planned on being a scientist of some sort. I love Astronomy, biology, and chemistry and was sure art would be my back up. At 16 I had a teacher who showed me I should keep creating and push myself to improve on it and that’s what changed my path forever. I picked up photography as well and found out I loved it just as much as drawing and painting.
I’ve always been super visual, I am not the greatest with words.
For a while, it seemed like your Ig feed was filled with Gifs. How did you get into making gifs? What was the first one you created?
Gifs were a bit of a miracle for me. Before I began experimenting with them, I was actually going through a major creative rut due to anxiety and depression. I was so stuck for months. I kept taking photos and doodling but nothing was making me feel fulfilled. Eventually, I just went for it and created my first official GIF. After that, I just continued to go with it because they were so fun to see finished and I was proud of myself for taking on a new medium.
Gif or Jif?
GIF! I always tell everyone “I know it’s ‘JIF’ but I like saying ‘GIF.'”
One of your first placements was with Netflix for Girl Boss. How did that happen?
My first placement was a result of being a GIPHY artist. I became a GIPHY artist quickly after I uploaded a few GIFs onto the platform. They reached out to me and told me they were making me one of their artists and I was so excited. I was thinking, “Wow, they like what I’m doing here!” Motivated me, even more, to keep on going with GIFS. After a while, GIPHY reached out for the Netflix project. A few months ago, I was reached out by a production house because of my GIPHY channel. They were working with Spotify on a series and asked me to create an animation. More are expected to come from this project in the future 🙂 Can’t wait!
Are you still making an entire sticker pack of gifs with GIPHY for us to use on iMessage?
I created the pack and it’s been ready for the real world for a few months now, but GIPHY has yet to put it in the App Store… Stay tuned.
Over the summer you said, “I’ve always appreciated the neon signs in front of salons.” Is that what inspires a lot of your gifs?
My Gifs are inspired by light. I loveeee lights + Sunlight. It’s the glow standing out in the darkness that catches my eye. Just like stars. I can never be sad looking at stars.
I always loved neon and it’s colors, stars + space for that reason. Color is a huge factor in my gifs as well. You’ll notice a pattern of the subject matter. All inspired by my love for science, and just my imagination.
I’ve seen you now do some window painting for some stores. You do it all, but, how has that been going for you?
Window painting was something I’ve wanted to do since I was very young. I remember passing by stores as a kid and just staring at the holiday art hoping I could do that one day cause it looked so fun. I’m three windows in and It’s been going pretty well. I have another planned out for Valentine’s Day 🙂
Chicago Creatives 