MAKING A DIFFERENCE
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Sad Animations
...for the hard times
For illustrator Irina Mir, depression came out of nowhere. “I have no idea why it came on. I’m in a really good place. Financially stable, good family, loving relationship,” explains the Russian-born artist.
Mir is the artist behind one of the App Store’s most unique Messages sticker packs, Sad Animations. The collection of animated characters depict a variety of difficult feelings and experiences, from extreme exhaustion to social anxiety and emotional eating. At once they are emotive, relatable and adorable.
Midway through last year, 29-year-old Mir, who works as a freelance designer in Chile, suddenly began suffering with depression and anxiety. “I felt dullness and apathy,” she explains. “It was as though life was not worth living. Nothing brought joy anymore.”
Having moved to Chile three years ago with her husband, Ivan, Mir was a long way from her home town of St. Petersburg. She had never previously experienced a mental health disorder and has no friends whom she knows to have been through something similar.
I couldn't find stickers that honestly expressed how I was feeling.
Sad Animations Illustrator, Irina Mir
After her husband urged her to seek professional help, Mir decided to try a therapeutic method called acceptance and commitment therapy.
“It gives you mindfulness strategies to deal with your emotions. So, the goal is not to eliminate the difficult feelings, but to acknowledge and stay present with them”, Mir explains.
“What I found helped was not only opening up towards these feelings myself, but also opening up about the feelings to others.”
And this is how Sad Animations came about. They were borne out of Mir’s frustration at not having a way to explain the struggle she was experiencing. “I think it was mostly from trying to express these feelings to my partner,” she says.
“I looked through a lot of the sticker packs [on the App Store]. Lots of the stickers with happy-go-lucky, funny cartoons,” explains Mir.
“I couldn’t find something that honestly expressed how I was feeling, and I thought it was something I could do that might also help other people.”
With previous animation experience from working with her husband, a programmer, on indie games, Mir began experimenting with creating stickers of her own. “I chose a style which was super-simple and minimal because I wanted everyone to be able to relate to it. I didn’t want to bring a lot of my own personality into it.”
All of the Sad Animations show “everyday things that happen when you’re in this kind of state,” adds Mir. “The emotional eating one – stuffing yourself with cookies – that’s something that happened to me a lot.”
“In a creative sense, it was fun to come up with the images” says Mir, explaining that drawing her Sad Animations “was absolutely therapeutic for me.”
“What gave me hope and motivation was the idea that I would be able to help other people. It was not negativity and self-pity that I was trying to express. It was about making something that can help you honestly express where you are right now and work with it – either on your own or with other people you are sending them to. They can help you to feel that you’re not alone.”
What gave me hope and motivation was the idea that I would be able to help other people.
Irina Mir
Mir currently feels well and that her depression and anxiety are under control. And, to her delight, the response to her Sad Animations online has been wholly positive. “People just thank me,” she says. “They say this is something that they can definitely identify with.”
Taking heart from this, Mir and her husband now want to turn their attention on educating people on mental health issues. “We are going to set up a non-profit organisation and use our skills to make infographics or educational games to help children aged eight to 12 know more about mental health,” says Mir. “This is now my goal and aim in life.”