Kira Noir
Kira Noir
Nu-MetalEvery riff is something I couldn’t say out loud.
DEPTH-DOMINANT · THE ORACLE ENDING · 11 TRACKSThe Dossier
She doesn’t scream. She just plays louder until you feel it in your ribs.
Kira Noir is the wound BaddieHaus refuses to bandage — the artist who turns damage into distortion and distortion into something you can’t stop listening to. Her nu-metal rips through the Haus’s polished surface like a blade through silk, and that’s exactly why she’s here. She’s the seventh for a reason: she’s the one who closes the show.
The Shadow
Issue
The closing file, and the longest. Four looks, all black, shot across a flat cyc, a wall of wet glass, a two-gel studio — and then drawn, because one of them refused to be photographed. Every palette below is sampled from the frame beside it.
LOOK 01 / 04 — THE CYC
Sat Still
For Once
Dead centre, dead symmetrical, hands in her lap and the whole frame holding its breath. The cyc measured flat enough to run straight off the edge of the photograph and become the page, so it does.
Cyc #9AADAA · Flat to 4 values · No separation
Garments
- Sharp-shoulder blazer, deep plunge
- High black collar, worn under
- Crescent-moon drop, right ear only
- Blunt bob, cut to the jaw
- Bare knees. Nothing softened.
Palette
Sampled from source frame
Sonic Pairing
LOOK 02 / 04 — THE GLASS
Half
Dissolved
Shot through a wet textured pane with the light raking across it, so the glass eats the left half of her and leaves the profile intact. Nothing was added in post. She just stood behind it and closed her eyes.
Garments
- Pinstripe blazer, shoulder built up
- Silver hoop, single
- Bob cut shorter, blunter
- Hard side light. Wet pane. No post.
Palette
Sampled from source frame
Sonic Pairing
LOOK 03 / 04 — SHOT & DRAWN
One of these was taken. The other was decided.
Studded
Magenta from the left, teal from the right, and several hundred steel studs catching both at once. The only frame in the file with colour in it.
Plated
Not a photograph. Two flat inks, ochre and black, brush marks left showing. The closing look in the closing file, and it was never shot at all.
Garments
- Studded leather biker, red lining
- Mesh knit tank, worn under
- Four-strand chain choker
- Gold huggies, stacked
Garments
- Black slip, plunge neck
- Crescent-moon hoop, right ear
- Bob drawn heavier than it is
- Two inks. No halftone.
Palette
Sampled from source frame
Palette
Sampled from source frame · two-ink
Sonic Pairing
Sonic Pairing
Contact Sheet
Vol. 07 · Selects & outtakesThe Mirror Test
Twice,
and worse
Shot in a dressing room with three mirrors, which she chose, and then complained about.
I notice. That is the entire job.
The Interview · Kira Noir
In her
own words
Twenty minutes, and she used all of them.
You have a reputation.
I have a reputation because I earned one. People say difficult when they mean she noticed. I notice. That is the entire job.
You are the harshest judge on the panel. Is that a bit?
It is not a bit. Everyone else in that room is trying to be nice to you and you will learn nothing from it. I am the only one treating you like the work matters. You are welcome, eventually.
Semitra says you know what you did.
Semitra says things like that to see which one of us flinches. I did several things. She will have to be more specific, and she will not be, because that is her whole act.
What actually gets your respect?
Somebody who takes the note and comes back worse but braver. I can work with braver. I cannot do anything with someone who is already perfect and boring.
Guilty pleasure.
Baking. Properly — scales, timers, the whole thing. It is the only place where being exact is a virtue instead of a personality flaw people write about.
Favourite place to visit.
Iceland, off season, when the tourists have gone and it gets dark at three. Nothing out there is trying to be liked. It is very restful, being somewhere with no opinion about me.
Twenty minutes, and she used all of them.
Discography
11 TRACKS
