Written by Thea Martynska
IDONTWANNAMESSTHISUP: So, tell us about you, how old are you? Where did you grow up?
Silva: I’m Silva I’m 22 from South Wales, I was born in Earls field in Southwest London, but I have no memory of it. I moved to Southeast London when I was 18 to Penge first of all, and did my foundation at Camberwell, then somehow I ended up doing illustration (also at Camberwell). I took a year out to be a carer for my mum for a while, so it’s taken me a while to finish but this is my final year, so I finish in June.
IDONTWANNAMESSTHISUP: So how did you get into illustration?
Silva: I think because I’m very interested in the difference between fine art and illustration and the main thing is communication, it’s whether you’re trying to communicate an issue or trying to express an issue and I think that I was always trying to communicate something and involve the audience very much in the things I was making. I was interested in giving as well as making, so I wanted to make something I could then give.
IDOTNWANNAMESSTHISUP: What’s your process?
Silva: I think for me making is a form of mindfulness and I didn’t know that for a long time. I think a subconscious kind of thing is that actually it’s really nice to be able to sit down and make. I’ve been lucky enough to not feel trapped by one visual tone and just be okay with being like, ‘okay so today I’m going to make a beat on garage band, or today I’m gonna look at these home movies and put them together or today I’m gonna be the cartoonist or writer’. I don’t know if i have a process I think it’s more just like I have a real urge to make and I don’t know where that comes from.
IDONTWANNAMESSTHISUP: What challenges have you faced?
Silva: I can get very caught up in theory and thinking too much about process and too much about what process means. Going down this crazy rabbit hole of, ‘Why do we make in the first place?’ and then you end up learning something about yourself that you might not have done. So, it’s kind of helpful to be so neurotic but unhelpful in the fact that you take a huge amount of time doing it.
IDONTWANNAMESSTHISUP: Tell us about your character Uma?
Silva: I started off with trying to draw one character again and again because that’s kind of the thing that makes you an ‘illustrator’, being able to have a character you can draw in any angle or situation. I had someone tell me that it was so simple that it actually worked, so then she just became this fun amalgamation of my voice and different voices, and then actually an amalgamation of anxiety, which is maybe a bit unfair to her.
I feel this sort of endearing separation from her, I don’t really know anything about her, she’s just this person who speaks to me sometimes, so I’m like ‘fine I’ll write that down’. I don’t agree with everything she has to say but that’s nice in a way. In the works is a collection of Uma so hopefully it will make more sense then!
IDONTWANNAMESSTHISUP: Where do you see your work evolving from here?
Silva: I’m definitely in the bookmaking realm of things at the moment, it’s a really perfect way to collate work. Putting things into a book and then giving it to someone is just such a nice thing, and a way of ending the thought that you’re having. I’m really not bothered about what it is I’m doing it’s more about how I communicate it.
IDONTWANNAMESSTHISUP: So, have you got any new ideas you’re working on at the moment
Silva: I’m looking at psychogeography and what one’s environment and one’s space does to them creatively. I’m kind of thinking about longing for a certain type of environment. It’s definitely quite hard to explain. I made a book in may called ‘I’m home you’re honey’ and it was all about what the home is and where home is and what having a difficult relationship with home looks like for you. I think I’m just interested in thinking about rural environments. I’m also really interested in map making and making maps from memory, how someone remembers environments and relationships with them.
IDONTWANNAMESSTHISUP: Do you have any influences or inspirations for your work?
Silva: I’m a massive Moomins fan, I watch it almost every night with my partner, we’re trying to get through the whole thing together. I like the whimsical friendly not to heavy right level of neurotic type thing. It’s the ‘Yea we’re all human, we’re all feeling these weird things and here’s a good way of me telling you about these things without it being so unbearable. My childhood and my parents and grandparents really influenced me.
I’ve been put in this space since I was 18 where I’ve been told, ‘you don’t have to get a job’, ‘you have a student loan, do what you like’ and what that does to a person is it makes you go a bit crazy in like a good way because you can do exactly what your head tells you to do and put it out there.
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