CGD

Julie Černá is among the few talented people whose work receives attention even before they graduate from middle school. She was first featured at the 2019 FIK festival of illustration and comics in Ústí nad Labem where her work caused an uproar. Since then, her projects have shown an immense level of consistency – whether she is creating comics, illustrations or animations, she always develops a unique atmosphere by means of dada-like micro-stories and her characteristic poetics that draw as much from the work of David Lynch as from after-lunch coffee and dessert at her parents’. Julie’s illustrations are formally very civil, fragile and subtle – she does not aim to shock and awe but rather cultivates intimacy and a close connection with her readers.

And that is what she did in her comics trilogy Stone of Destiny and its subsequent adaptation into an animated short film. She had originally published the comic in three “acts” at her own expense, and this year (three years after having finished it) it has finally been officially published by the UMPRUM Publishing House. Its film adaptation (also from this year) has furthermore received wide acclaim on the international scene – its world premiere was at the Berlinale International Film Festival, and it has since been featured by more than fifty international film festivals in over thirty countries, from the US and Japan to Iceland and Australia. It has also received many nominations and special mentions in competitions, as well as the Jury Prize for Best Student Film at the Bucheon International Animation Festival in South Korea.

So what is so unusual about Stone of Destiny? Essentially everything – its lyrical lack of linear plot, its slightly unsettling symbolism which is hard to put one’s finger on but which chills us to the bone, the austere linework juxtaposed with dense pastels… We have been hearing a lot about Julie Černá, and we will be hearing much more about her in the coming years.

Barbora Müllerová