APKE... Let's reveal the mystery!
- Erika
- Feb 26, 2017
- 2 min read
When somebody sees my name, the first question is "What does APKE mean? Is it an Italian word?"... Well... not at all! APKE has nothing to do with Italian language, but it's more about a
weird girl in middle school: ME!
When I was in middle school, around 12 years old, I started drawing... Nothing special, I just enjoyed drawing and sometimes copying the comics and everything that captured my attention.
Most of my "art" was done on my school journal (Smemoranda... awww how many sweet memories!)... All my life was on that journal, but not my homework!
(Sorry for the poor quality of these, but I don't have the original anymore!)
So I thought I wanted to be a cool girl, and I wanted to sign my drawing with something different than my name, something that a street artist would use to mark his (or her) murals... So I came up with APKE!
I just inverted the first and last letters in my name, add the P from my last name and the K... well the K was always my pride and joy... it's a letter not present in the Italian alphabet, but I have it in my name... K is always been my special letter... So there it is... APKE! (pronounced: 'APP-Kĕ)
I started liking it more and more, studying how to make it more cool with a special font and then came my "artistic" signature...
I never followed up with my drawing and now I lost a little bit of that ability, I think... but when I started to take pictures, back in 2010, I automatically signed them with the same signature, APKE. Something different from my name, the one on the scientific papers that characterize my scientific career.
Now that I've been more serious and consistent about photography I thought about changing the name of it, putting my real name... but... APKE is a real me, it is the artistic version of me. The one who dreamed to go to the Artistic Institute High School, instead of getting into Classical Study... The one who used to draw while the prof was teaching Sophocles or Cicero... the one who, now, loves to use all that knowledge to capture the emotions around...
Oh, and why did I choose the olive branch around my name for my logo? Well, I come from Salento, an amazing area in South Italy (the most amazing if you ask me!), where red soil and olive trees reign in the countryside... Some of those trees are old more than 100 years and I like to think they preserve our historical memories. I can still see this little girl looking out the window of the car and feeling amazed by those gigantic trees.
I wanted to include also my roots in this new step of my life!
So, at the end, there is the explanation... No, APKE isn't an Italian word, It's just another side of myself!
Erika P.
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