Tiffany Baxter

Amelia’s Magazine | An interview with Tiffany Baxter: Amelia’s Colourful Colouring Companion featured artist.

by

Tiffany Baxter 6
Recently graduated illustrator Tiffany Baxter contributes a whirling dervish of an image inspired by the Saint Vitus Dance of the medieval period, full of fanciful characters in colourful clothing.

Tiffany spreadsmall
Why did you decide to illustrate the St Vitus Dance for the colouring book and what is happening in your picture?
It was a subject I’d heard briefly about when researching witchcraft and I found it fascinating so looked into it more. Even though now it’s thought to be a mass psychogenic illness, beyond that there doesn’t seem to be any idea about what caused it. Historical imagery shows people affected by mania but in my portrayal I suppose I tried to demonstrate what could be going on from the point of view of the dancers themselves. As with most odd phenomena back then, it was frequently thought to be demons or magic forces behind it all so that was the angle I was going for – a happy but insidious trance.

Tiffany Baxter photo
How did you create the piece and what is your most used art material?
I started out sketching thumbnails and rough ideas in my sketch book but then the whole piece was actually drawn in Photoshop with a Cintiq tablet. Most used would be Photoshop for digital work or with traditional media I’ve most used a brush pen and a magic pencil lately!

Tiffany Baxter 7
How do you research the mystical and esoteric for your artwork?
It will sound rather boring I suppose but mainly it’s just a whole lot of reading! London has a few specialist bookstores where I’ve managed to find loads of interesting books that you wouldn’t really find anywhere else unless you really knew exactly what you wanted.

Tiffany Baxter 8
Which bit of history is your favourite, why, and how has this influenced your work?
That’s a surprisingly tough question! I much prefer the personal side of history as opposed to hard facts of wars etc, how people actually lived is so captivating, what was different but also the same. Also the mystery of it, my current interest has been in early British history, of which there is so much we don’t know because early Britons had no written record, so a lot is left to the imagination. As for its influence, I’m always world building and thinking of my own characters and the past is a great point of inspiration in making something simultaneously familiar but strange, even on just a design level.

Tiffany Baxter 3
Where is the best place for people watching… and drawing?
Usually on the train or tube. People are still for long enough to draw them, though you have to be a bit sneaky about it so they don’t think you’re strange.

Tiffany Baxter 2
How does a combination of the classics and video games influence your work?
With classics it’s more that, they’re classic for a reason, they’re ultimately just good stories that absorb readers into caring about the characters. Additionally video games as well as often having beautiful character/world design are so unique among media in that they’re on the border between being a passive and an active experience. You can create something that really touches the audience in an entirely different way than say a book or television; as the players have a say in the outcome and I think that’s really special. So in short I suppose, storytelling is what has really influenced my work.

tiffany baxter-willhouse
Can you tell us more about your recent project for the BBC?
It was part of a live brief as part of my university course, and myself and a few of my peers were chosen to continue on with the project. It was for a BBC2 documentary following families through generations from the Victorian era through to present day that has yet to air – they needed drawings to then be animated for zoetrope scenes. It was really fun working with the team as well as just learning the stories of these people and being able to represent them even in a small way.

tiffany baxter-waldahouses
Since you’ve graduated you are now between London and Milton Keynes, is there any exciting art happening in your home town that we should know about?
I’m slightly ashamed to say I’m rather out of the loop with the local art scene after being in London for so long, so I only know a few illustrators and of course the local art gallery. It would be nice to see art flourish here though, especially as Milton Keynes doesn’t always necessarily have the best reputation in that regard I don’t think!

tiffany baxter-Upholsterer+mockup
Where and when can people see your upcoming group exhibition?
The exhibition is called Veneficus and is at Treadwell’s Books on Store Street in London from the 23rd October through to the 30th. The Facebook event is here if you want to check it out!

tiffany baxter -fka twigs
Tiffany is joined by her fellow Camberwell graduate Percie Edgeler in Amelia’s Colourful Colouring Companion, interview coming soon.

Written by Amelia Gregory on Thursday September 24th, 2015 10:55 am

Categories ,Adult Coloring Book, ,Adult Colouring, ,Amelia’s Colourful Colouring Companion, ,Camberwell College of Art, ,Cintiq tablet, ,Coloring, ,Coloring Book, ,Colouring Book, ,interview, ,Milton Keynes, ,St Vitus Dance, ,Tiffany Baxter, ,Trance, ,Treadwell’s Books, ,Veneficus

Similar Posts:






Amelia’s Magazine | An interview with Percie Edgeler: Amelia’s Colourful Colouring Companion featured artist.

by

percie edgeler
Percie Edgeler is another recent graduate of Camberwell College of Arts, (see also Tiffany Baxter) whose work caught my eye at the graduate shows. She contributes an unusual and wonderful piece for Amelia’s Colourful Colouring Companion inspired by a Japanese folk tale

percie edgeler
What kind of artwork will you be creating on the theme of magic and rituals for your upcoming group exhibition?
I’m not entirely sure yet. I have a few different ideas I need to figure out the layouts for. We’ve been given some guidelines by the lovely people at Treadwell’s Books (the venue) and we can’t have anything three dimensional due to size of the space, so that’s definitely not an option. Luckily it’s with a very friendly group of people from a mix of disciplines, including Tiffany Baxter, who’s being included in the colouring book, and we can share our ideas quite easily and get feedback on what we think is best collectively.

percie edgeler
Why have you decided to push your artwork into 3 dimensions and how are you progressing?
I trained and work now as an illustrator, which most would assume is primarily a two dimensional way of working. Three dimensional work has never been my strong point, and by making ceramics I’m trying to push myself not to be limited to one skill. I guess in part it’s also a question of style: if I’m limiting myself to working in a certain way, my two dimensional work won’t evolve from what it already is because it’s not being challenged. It’s slow progress because I don’t know much about three dimensional forms, but I’m learning. I chose to start with ceramics because to me it seems the most natural. I’ve always worked quite traditionally with my hands, so being able to hold and lump of clay and form it makes more sense to me than any other three dimensional form for now. At the moment everything I try to shape is quite wobbly, I’ve made a fair few wobbly dogs, but they’re getting better over time.

percie edgeler
In what way does the built environment inspire you?
At the risk of being too political, my generation is limited in terms of housing; so it’s hard for us not to notice the built environment more than ever. It’s interesting when you go to other countries and see their architecture how in comparison the UK has a mixture of old and new that is juxtaposed. The spaces in which we work and play can no longer be limited to a building. I’m lucky in that the area I live in is the greenest borough in London, and for me it’s easy to go into a park or field without losing my connection to the city. But now we need more housing and infrastructure, those green areas are increasingly under threat. There’s a balance of being part of something man made and something natural which I really enjoy, though recently in what I’ve been drawing I’ve been erring towards the natural. Often we don’t take the time to consider what’s there already because we’re used to it, and I think now as an adult I appreciate that environment a lot more.

percie edgeler
Why did you decide to focus on a Japanese fairytale for your colouring book page?
There’s something very honest about Japanese folk stories. There’s so many different ones, and in the Japanese culture it’s not just a fairy tale, it’s a part of life, a tale of a time before our time. The way they’re told is mostly through spoken word; more reportage than storytelling like we have in Europe. And the way someone tells a story verbally is very different to how one may draw one, with the storyteller adding their own inflections or details which others may not. That culture of storytelling is still there now, I think; if you read a novel by a contemporary Japanese author, say for instance the ever popular Haruki Murakami, the facts are given with such detail that it’s fascinating. In 1Q84, Murakami writes about two people who have loved each other for years and in one scene they miss each other by minutes. That pure feeling expressed in folk stories is still there, and that’s absolutely lovely. I chose to base the artwork for my colouring book page on a folk tale for this reason. I wanted to give my own take, and share a story in a new way that people could interact with.

percie edgeler
Which cultures are you most enjoying learning the folk tales about and why?
I enjoy learning the folk tales from most cultures, be it from European cultures or further afield. I think my favourite so far is a Maori one talking about how Ta Moko, a form of facial tattooing, came to their tribe as there is no distinguishing between what happened in the story as fact or fiction. Icelandic folk tales are also quite enjoyable as they can be quite traditional by Western standards but also feature dark elements.

percie edgeler
What is it that you love about books and what kind of books do you hope to make yourself one day?
As childrens’ books are an escape. You can live a hundred times through all those characters and have all of those adventures through reading them. As an adult, the same can still apply on some level but they also help to challenge a lot of issues in society and reflect on society at that time. Precisely because of that, my long term goal is to work with books. Every opportunity I’ve had to work with books has just confirmed that. I want to make books for children that they can enjoy, but also want to make them accessible for adults; reading to children and encouraging them to read should be something to have fun with, though very few books achieve that.

percie edgeler
How did you get involved with Four Corners Books and what did you do with them?
Through my university in our final year we had a choice of external projects for a range of different people; e.g. the BBC, Tate Modern, Nexus. I chose the Four Corners one because I wanted to make something outside of my comfort zone of something narrative. By creating animal images from the Edwardian short story of Saki’s Sredni Vashtar, I was pushed to do something different but still work with books and illustration in a way that I felt made the project fun and exciting.

percie edgeler
What happens in your story about a man and a dog?
A boy loses his dog after the dog runs out of the house because the dog is tired of never being played with. The boy, desperately sorry for his actions, chases the dog out and follows him on his adventures around the world only to miss him and his incredible feats each time. It escalates and escalates until eventually, unable to find him, the boy goes home and gives up – but luckily for him, that’s not the end of the story. I don’t want to give too much away because it’s something I definitely want to complete and put out into the world. Maybe that’s a little self indulgent. When I started it for the Macmillan Prize in 2014, I felt like giving up on illustration. It made drawing exciting again and forced me to keep going.

percie edgeler
What was the best thing to come out of your graduate exhibition Rock, Paper, Scissors in Hoxton?
I think the best thing to come out of my graduate exhibition was the experience of doing something on such a large scale. I managed the Kickstarter for it with a small group of people, and that was insanely difficult. We raised about two hundred pounds over what we needed in that in the few hours before it finished, so it allowed us to cover a lot of extras which really made a difference to the exhibition as a whole. Also the venue let me recreate a mural I did inside the university, albeit on a smaller scale, which was really enjoyable. I also ran a paper marbling workshop while there and that was really fun to do, especially with little kids. It was messy though so their parents probably weren’t too pleased!

What else have you been doing this year, it sounds like you’ve been super busy!
Two weeks after I graduated I was offered a job interning at Kritical Mass, a company which works with charities and businesses trying to make a change with their products in a positive way; so through them I’ve been given some work for clients such as BirdLife International which has been great. For them I’ve made a set of illustrations concerning the decline in vulture population which has been really interesting, I’ve learnt a lot from it which I wouldn’t learn in any other job. I’ve been quite lucky this year in that I was also featured in Secret 7” which was held at Somerset House for the first time, and also had work in Belly Kids’ ‘Milhouse From Memory’ exhibition. I have a few projects in the pipelines as well now which are something a bit different to what I’ve done before; so from here I’m interested to see where I can go and what I can do, I’m excited for what’s to come.

Written by Amelia Gregory on Wednesday September 30th, 2015 12:00 pm

Categories ,1Q84, ,26 illustrators, ,Adult Coloring Book, ,Adult Colouring Book, ,BirdLife International, ,Camberwell College of Arts, ,Coloring Book, ,Colouring Book, ,Four Corners Books, ,Haruki Murakami, ,illustration, ,Kickstarter, ,Kritical Mass, ,Macmillan Prize, ,Milhouse From Memory, ,Percie Edgeler, ,Rock Paper Scissors, ,Secret 7”, ,Sredni Vashtar, ,Ta Moko, ,Tiffany Baxter, ,Treadwell’s Books

Similar Posts:






Amelia’s Magazine | Celebrating Women in Music: Producing It For Themselves

by

FKA Twigs by Tiffany Baxter
FKA Twigs by Tiffany Baxter.

The music industry would have us believe women are dominating the music scene right now. Fierce, female, singer/songwriters are in abundance. We’ve got Miley on her wrecking ball, Beyonce grinding her surf board, Lady Gaga covered in ham. We’re winning ladies… I digress, we shouldn’t be laughing. Whilst the dominant, mainstream female artists claim to be writing their own music and be heavily involved in the creative process, the other side of the mixing desk is another story. The domination does not extend to production.

Trina Shoemaker mixing desk
There are plenty of high flying women in other areas of the music business. But despite the BBC starting to train female sound engineers in 1941, it is still a predominantly male playing field. Trina Shoemaker is a brilliant exception to this and was the first woman to take home a Grammy for ‘Best Sound Engineer’ in 1998 for her work on Sheryl Crow’s album Globe Sessions.

Women in music illustration Louise Andersone
Women in music: illustration by Louise Andersone.

However, only three women in history have been nominated for ‘Best Producer’ at the Brits and Grammys and we are yet to see the day a woman goes home with the prize. Perhaps this isn’t even a gender issue. According to The Music Producers Guild, women only hold 4% of the equity in music production. There just aren’t enough women in the sector. There are an array of arguments on the reasons behind this figure, ranging from women being disinterested in the technical side of things to sexism, to the age old restraint of becoming a mother and its incompatibility with the lifestyle and all consuming nature of a being a studio producer. Who knows what the truth is. Perhaps it’s a mish mash of the lot of them and then some.

Joni Mitchell Clouds Album Cover
Joni Mitchell complained that whichever man was in the room with her when she was recording, he would take credit for her work. Bjork has recently echoed a similar sentiment in a recent interview with Pitchfork stating that time and time again she has been denied due credit for the production of her albums. In another Pitchfork interview in 2007, the highly skilled MIA laid into the interviewer regarding the production of her records, ‘I just find it a bit upsetting and kind of insulting that I can’t have any ideas on my own because I’m a female… After the first time it’s cool, the second time it’s cool, but after like the third, fourth, fifth time, maybe it’s an issue that we need to talk about, maybe that’s something important, you know.’

Delia Derbyshire Radiophonic Workshop
Despite their low numbers, there have been some formidable women sitting behind that mixing desk throughout the history of recording. Take Delia Derbyshire for starters. Delia who? Derbyshire. Despite being told in 1959 by Decca Records that the recording studio was no place for a woman, she persevered and joined the BBC Radiophonic Workshop in 1960. A genius to sound, Derbyshire was responsible for the recording of Ron Grainer’s Doctor Who theme in 1963 and earned herself an incredible reputation as an innovator in sound before the age of the synthesiser. At a time when groups and composers were exploring Psychedelia, she was feted by musicians all over the world including McCartney, Hendrix and Pink Floyd and in her latter days she co produced with Sonic Boom and heavily influenced modern experimental groups including Portishead, Orbital and The Chemical Brothers.

sylvia-robinson
Remember The Sugar Hill Gang and their hit ‘Rappers Delight’? Product of a woman. The first commercially successful rap recording that brought rap music to a global audience was produced by the late Sylvia Robinson in 1979. For this alone she should be a household name, but by no means was that the extent of her success. At the age of 16 she had a number 1 hit in America, she penned hits for the likes of Ike and Tina Turner, produced one of the first ever disco singles and founded multiple record labels. In the late sixties she was one of the few women to be producing records and in 1979, when she started Sugar Hill Records, almost all of the recordings were still produced in house and overseen by herself. That other big hip hop classic ‘The Message’ by Grand Master Flash? She was the driving force behind that too.

Women may be few and far between in production roles but that doesn’t take away from their ability. As music technology is becoming more accessible, a new generation of self taught, self sufficient, women are rising, producing their own records, and taking the music industry by storm. Check out this lot.

lykke-li-portrait
Lykke Li
Lykke Li plunged onto the music scene back in 2007 with her debut EP ‘Little Bit’. Her voice was quirky and her tracks an intriguing take on indie pop. Writing her own songs, composing melodies and recording demos, Lykke has then worked with male counterparts Björn Yttling and Lasse Mårtén to produce the finished product. As co producer on her latest LP ‘I Never Learn’ she had more creative input than ever and has come up with all the ideas for her music videos since she started. Having established herself as a credible artist and three albums into her career, she still notices and comments during an interview with The Guardian that ‘the rules for women in music are tacitly different… If I’m on stage and it’s warm and I don’t want to wear trousers all of a sudden I’m a victim, but if Iggy Pop takes his shirt off? Oh, that’s fine.’ Thought she was just another female performer surrounded by great people producing and directing her? Think again. She’s business savvy too having created LL Recordings in 2007. Releasing all of her work under her own label to protect and give herself freedom, this woman is a power house of vision.


Tw-ache – Twigs remixed one of her first tracks ‘Ache’, co directed the video with Tom Beard and shows off her dance moves. A force to be reckoned with.

FKA Twigs
English Singer/songwriter FKA Twigs has taken the world by storm. After teaching herself the music software package Ableton, Twigs went on to produce her debut EP in 2012 entitled EP1, which she self released on bandcamp. In 2013 she worked with top producer Arca and released her second EP, EP2. Having proved herself, Twigs collaborated with several other producers including Arca, Emile Haynie, Devonté Hynes, Paul Epworth and Clams Casino on her debut album LP1 to help her fill in the gaps in areas she felt she needed guidance. Both male and female artists employ these methods. As a professionally trained dancer, Twigs has also taken full control of her music videos. She knows what she wants and refuses to sacrifice her creativity for popularity. It seems to be a winning philosophy as in her few years on the music scene she’s already been nominated for a Brit, a Grammy and the Mercury Prize. This woman is fierce and a real inspiration to young women.

snowapple illusion album cover

Video for Snowapple’s latest single ‘California’

Snowapple
This unassuming, all girl trio are another wonderful example of women taking control of their music. Snowapple play dozens of instruments, layering beautiful harmonies over the top, creating an eclectic folk sound. Being entirely responsible for the creative side of things they’ve gone one step further and are also in charge of their own bookings, management and production. The Amsterdam based trio have many self made women as colleagues and see a shift in the way things are moving, ‘The music industry is still an old boys club but we believe the decisiveness of female entrepreneurs is very powerful and we are conquering more and more space!’ Their new album ‘Illusion’ is out now.

Isolde women in music
Isolde
An emerging artist from Bristol, Isolde is yet another young female, producing her own material. Creating each track from scratch, she then gets busy fleshing them out with instrumentation and samples. She knows what she wants to hear and has taught herself how to communicate that. However she notes ‘I feel a lot of pressure, when entering this predominantly white, affluent, western male playing field, to prove my ‘techni-ness’. What I care about is the music, and how the technology enables me to create it.’ I don’t think she has to worry too much. Her debut EP ‘Seed Bud Bloom’ is a glorious patchwork of sounds she has collected over the years and full of her own personal essence.

There is a real platform now for women to have a shot at commercial success as producers and artists in their own right, moving away from the traditional glamourised and sexualised image. Women are becoming more confident in their abilities in all aspects of the music business and are reflecting their own identities and ideals.

It’s been a long road and there is still a considerable amount of distance to cover but it’s an exciting time as more and more women are challenging traditional perceptions.

Written by Gemma Dietrich on Friday March 13th, 2015 12:35 pm

Categories ,Ache, ,Arca, ,BBC Radiophonic Workshop, ,Best Producer, ,Best Sound Engineer, ,bjork, ,Björn Yttling, ,Brits, ,Clams Casino, ,Decca Records, ,Delia Derbyshire, ,Devonté Hynes, ,Emile Haynie, ,EP1, ,EP2, ,FKA Twigs, ,Globe Sessions, ,Grammys, ,Grand Master Flash, ,I Never Learn, ,Ike and Tina Turner, ,Illusion, ,Isolde, ,Joni Mitchell, ,Lasse Mårtén, ,Little Bit, ,LL Recordings, ,Louise Andersone, ,LP1, ,Lykke Li, ,MIA, ,Music Industry, ,Music Production, ,Paul Epworth, ,Pitchfork, ,Rappers Delight, ,Ron Grainer, ,Seed Bud Bloom, ,Sheryl Crow, ,Snowapple, ,Sonic Boom, ,Sugar Hill Records, ,Sylvia Robinson, ,The Message, ,The Music Producers Guild, ,The Sugar Hill Gang, ,Tiffany Baxter, ,Tom Beard, ,Trina Shoemaker, ,Women in Music

Similar Posts: