Meet Alice Tye | Illustrator & Painter

We had the good fortune of connecting with Alice Tye and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Alice, how do you think about risk?
To follow any kind of creative path as a career is taking a big risk. From the time we’re at school we’re told that art is not a stable or reliable career and are generally advised to pursue something that has a more linear career path. I was very fortunate that my parents encouraged me and my siblings to pursue the creative paths that we were passionate about however that didn’t make the decision to choose illustration as a career less risky.

I chose to study Illustration over Fine Art or Painting because I enjoy working within the constraints of a given brief and I suppose subconsciously it seemed like a clearer and perhaps safer path to follow once I left university. Upon graduating from Camberwell College of Art (UAL) in 2013 I discovered that it wasn’t as easy as I’d hoped and my career thus far has been a series of risks with a lot of hard work and a lot of juggling multiple jobs at once. The creative industries are volatile and whilst you may have a very successful, busy year one year the next might be dead quiet. It takes a lot of holding your nerve to stay in the industry.

Putting art out into the world can feel very daunting as its like showing a very personal side of yourself to an unknown audience, but I think the risk in that is why most artists continue to create work. You are constantly evolving as an artist, you are always aiming to experiment with your work and uncover something new.

Can you open up a bit about your work and career? We’re big fans and we’d love for our community to learn more about your work.
I always knew that I wanted to go to art school rather than a more academic university so when I left school in 2009 I went to Camberwell College of Arts (UAL) to do an Art Foundation Diploma and then in 2010 I stayed on at Camberwell to do a BA in Illustration.

In the last two years of my degree I started lithographic printmaking which then led me to painting in oils which I had been resistant to trying throughout school, foundation and the start of my degree. But once I found the medium I wanted to work in it really opened up how I worked and was a huge turning point for me.

When I graduated in 2013 I started getting a few commercial illustration jobs and exhibited as a solo artist and as part of an illustration collective at Pick Me Up Graphics and Illustration Fair at Somerset House in London. The press and exposure from that led to more commercial work and I was able to start making a living as a freelance artist. I also worked a number of part time jobs alongside illustrating and it was never easy, being a freelance artist is a lot of hard work and juggling multiple jobs at once.

In 2015 I took a two month trip to the US with my partner – we started with a road trip from LA to Las Vegas, Palm Springs then up to Big Sur, Yosemite and San Francisco. After which we took the train to Chicago and New York City. For years before this trip my self-initiated paintings had been very LA focused and following our trip I made two large bodies of work based on our time on the West Coast – ‘USA IRL’ and ‘La Jolla Road Revisited’. I am still incredibly proud of both series and Los Angeles as well as American pop culture have continued to be a huge influence and inspiration for my work to this day.

Since then I have worked on some incredible commercial projects for Amazon Music, Carslberg and The Guardian and hope to work with many more exciting brands and companies in the future. I have also worked on numerous self-initiated projects based on places I’ve visited as well as film and television inspired still lifes and imagined road trips that I hope to eventually do for real.

I think currently the illustration market is struggling as companies are being more conservative with their budgets and scaling back projects, its definitely been a challenging few years since Covid and juggle of working non creative jobs alongside working as an illustrator is just as hard as it was back in 2013. I am currently expanding my creative skillset by experimenting with graphic design and of course still painting the forever captivating American landscapes.

Let’s say your best friend was visiting the area and you wanted to show them the best time ever. Where would you take them? Give us a little itinerary – say it was a week long trip, where would you eat, drink, visit, hang out, etc.
As I’m not a Los Angeles resident only a big fan of the city I will give you my favourite places that we visited on our honeymoon in 2022. We stayed in Silverlake and loved the wine bars and eating at Pine & Crane. I also love the amount of outdoor space you have access to – going for a run around Silver Lake Reservoir in the morning & hiking in Runyon Canyonand. I also love to visit Neutra VDL for a tour as well as the Eames House and Frank Lloyd Wright’s Hollyhock House – the Mid Century architecture was what originally drew me to painting Los Angeles and its incredible so many of the buildings are still so well preserved and there to visit.

Shoutout is all about shouting out others who you feel deserve additional recognition and exposure. Who would you like to shoutout?
I certainly wouldn’t have had the career I’ve had so far if I hadn’t studied Illustration at Camberwell College of Arts, University of the Arts London. I was very fortunate to have incredible tutors whilst I was there – Peter Nencini, Robert Nichol, Darryl Clifton and Geoff Coupland.

I am also very fortunate to have so many brilliant artists as friends who have always been encouraging and supportive – Caroline Rose Dunning, Alice Bowsher, Joe Gamble, Saara Karppinen, Ruta Daubure and Anna Skeels.

Website: https://www.alicetye.com

Instagram: @alicetye

Image Credits
last photo: commissioned by Amazon Music