#surely this is not a product of my being a gifted kid with severe burnout and abandonment issues lmao | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

artandhuddle · 5 years

Text

Artist Interview with Daphne Hutcheson

Last week I had the opportunity to speak with Daphne Hutcheson, an artist I’ve admired for quite some time. Her work and knowledge in the arts has helped me, along with many other artists in the online community.

Daphne Hutcheson, also known as @paperwick on social media, has been creating artwork from a very young age, with works in both traditional and digital media. Her work covers a broad range of fandoms, original content, and client based works along with some very useful and resourceful tutorials.

K: I wanted to first ask about your experience attending SCAD (Savannah College of Art & Design)?

D: My experience at SCAD was tepid at best. The teachers were good, but I mean very specifically the professors who were teaching in my major, which was sequential art. SCAD is really not a great institute for anyone who isn't rich enough for their parents' to cover the cost. That's my biggest issue with it, they will cripple you with debt, so if anyone is lower-income, I would highly suggest learning via some of great online courses or using a state college's art program to sort of direct you if you need direction and deadlines. I know I need them. SCAD's loans are no joke. The college itself was very good my first year, they do a lot to make sure incoming students feel heard and welcomed, and then after that they really don't try for you. As soon as you're a sophomore, they could care less about how you feel to be there. Their class attendance requirements are grueling and there's no room for accidents--you miss four class sessions and you fail the course. It's wild, and even if you're in the hospital, those absences will not be forgiven. If you're late, it counts as an absence.I don't recommend it. At all. All the learning I garnered there is online accessible these days, one just has to hunker down, find it, and put it to practice. My professors were great, but no education is worth that price tag. Depending on your major there, you will be treated differently by the school. For example, their fashion and fibers majors are doted on, whereas a major like animation is ground hard into the dirt. There were unrealisitc deadlines to meet for class projects and kids would be in the school buildings overnight trying to meet them. Some fell asleep in their chairs and Paula Wallace (the owner) saw that one day and had them replace the chairs with far less comfortable chairs. Some kids had heart attacks from staying up to meet deadlines. Such a bad work culture of "all-nighters". In part the students' fault, but none of the faculty really stopped it or discouraged it, save one teacher in a different major, and that being said, that teacher still gave ridiculous deadlines so we'd "be prepared for the industry". That's not at all what the industry is like (discluding the game industry right now). It is truly a hard place to thrive and everyone I've known who has graduated had months to years of burnout after finishing, including myself. I'd hazard real caution when choosing to go to a private art college, art institutes included.No education is worth that amount of debt.

K: Wow, that’s unfortunate to hear. I wonder if students are having similar experiences at colleges such as CAD or RISD?

D: I have heard very similar things about places like RISD and CAD where it’s all about the money, but I can’t point you towards any of the specifics. I really just want people to go into it with a clear head and know it’s going to be hard exiting. They really don’t prepare you for business.

K: What would you have done differently? Would you have signed up for online courses?

D: If I was to do it over, I would have liked to dive straight into developing personal projects, just making the work. Watching and reading free youtube videos and blog posts by artists. That would not have flown with my parents, they’re very by the book “go to college or get a job” type people. With than in mind, I would’ve gone to the local college I was within biking distance of as a sort of clean, and done fairly half assed studies by full assed my artwork.

K: That sounds like what a lot of artists, particularly those interested in digital art are doing. But, have you ever considered going back to school, or enrolling in a program or an atelier that you think would be beneficial to your art career?

D: Not genuinely. If I had time, I wouldn't mind enrolling in something that would teach me puppet animation, but between freelance and my day job, it's hard to find time to produce personal work and then also learn. I am pro-learning, always learning because that keeps your work fresh, keeps your mind sharp and ready to switch up on a dime. But course work is something I'm not super fond of, to be honest.

K: I understand. So, you've graduated and are currently doing freelance work along with your other day job. In your freelance work, what kind of work are you taking from clients?

D: Mostly I do storyboard animatics for a few advertising agencies, but I do some card art for games here and there, like Companion's Tale. I just signed on to do some tarot card artwork for a company called Legacy: Fables. I'll take anything that sounds interesting and that I have time for. It's all digital; traditional art is way more personal for me so I almost exclusively make traditional artwork as gifts for friends.

K: Are there any particular fandoms or genres that you tend to work more in?

D: As far as fandom work and commissions, it's Dragon Age all the way BABY! It's a good community and I owe a lot to them. I'm planning on reopening my tarot commissions here soon once I finish up a few of my freelance projects. I am an old hat with fantasy stuff and most comfortable there, but I really want to start working on robots and mechanics and cities. All that sci-fi goodness.

K: Wow, that's great to hear you've got very steady work, and they’re with industries and agencies! I hope you'll get to share that work once it's gone down the production pipeline. Have you ever considered applying for work with a company like EA/Bioware?

D: Yeah! I've lucked out a lot, it feels like all of this sort of dumped itself in my lap. My biggest resistance to applying to Bioware or any gaming industry position right is rooted in how they treat their workers. Bioware, specifically back when Anthem was released, had a nasty report come out on how management had run their workers to the point of many having mental breakdowns, and several just leaving and never coming back. They refer to those who have breakdowns while working during their months and months of crunch as "stress casualties", and I'm honestly quite disgusted by what I hear. I think once the gaming industry unionizes I'll consider applying, but the things I hear, not just about Bioware and EA... It's horrifying. Riot, Blizzard, Activision, Treyarch, Rockstar... the list could go on. Not to like tank the conversation into a dark place, I just have such strong feelings about it.

K: That's ok! It's good to hear different perspectives, especially when talking about the industry. Alright, on to the next question. Looking at your work, from sequential narrative to tarot artwork, I’m really impressed by your storytelling. When you’re creating stories and characters, do you pull a lot from your own experiences and emotions, or more from other sources such as music, film, or literature?

D: Ahh that's a hard one. I think I pull far more from outside of me than inside of me.The way things are shaped comes from my own experience, but I think a lot of my content comes from outside influences, like movies, books, music, and art.Howls Moving Castle, the book not the film, had a huge affect on me and how light I want the stories I tell to be, but I think I have a long way to go when putting stories together.I am super empathetic so it's easy to take outside influences and really feel them, but also it's hard to tell where I start and those influences ends.

K: Very well said, and the comment about the novel, I can really feel that in your personal work, especially your recent animated landscape piece.

D: Thanks!

K: The first time I came across your work was one of your Dragon Age tarot works, but also the tutorial on how you created them. It was incredibly helpful to me and I know to lots more artists. Your tutorials and words of advice have proven very successful, but have you ever received any advice or tutorials that really switched gears or level upped your techniques?

D: The answer is yes, absolutely. Let me see, I don't seek out tutorials anymore, but there was something I saw recently that was good. Sinix's head from any angle is a great approach to drawing faces at crazy angles. Also, check out Bunabi on Tumblr. Bunabi is so fast and her work is beautiful, and has great tutorials also, just incredible.

I unfortunately can’t link to any specifics, but tutorials like this one do me a lot of good.

People can just screenshot process stuff that reminds me that there are a million ways to approach art, like sketch up, grids, freehanding. I think I benefit from understanding that there are a million approaches more than following the tutorials super hard.

K: Great,thank you! I wanted to ask a few more questions, one about your Patreon. It seems like the next big wave for digital artists. How has it been creating one and keeping on top of the awards, and is there anything you would want to do differently with yours?

D: So Patreon is kind of a basket you can fill with prizes, maybe some of the prizes for money (probably prizes for money), and that works for a lot of people. I have a more of a "here's content I don't put elsewhere if you'd like it" approach to it cause I'm inconsistent with patron pay-outs. Patreon for artists with chronic mental illness is a struggle. Hands down. I started one hoping it would iron out my discipline issues a year or two back, and it didn't. It made me feel hella guilty cause I could not keep up with what I said I'd keep up with, and then I felt worse. It was disastrous. I refunded most of the pledges I got during the three months I had it open. Then I closed it for a year and brought it back online recently. Now all my content is free, it's still inconsistent, but if people want to support me I welcome it. I think Patreon is a good platform, but I will never be able to use it is intended. I respect the people who can keep up with it all, that kind of discipline takes a crazy amount of strength of character, but I don't motivate with money very well. In the end, I motivate through helping others as best I can, so it'll always be free content. I have very few plans for it, other than I want to put together a brush pack and share it there with brushes I made. I just need a moment to sit down and make that happen. I've got a tutorial for using photos to make quick painted backgrounds too, and I just have to organize that sucker.

K: Thank you for being so open about it. I think what you're doing is so insightful and helpful in what you're offering to your followers, especially those who may also be struggling with anxiety and depression.

K: Can you share what your process is like from a sketch to a finished piece? Do you thumbnail a lot before, use references to build from, and so on?

D: I like to do throw away thumbnails on notepaper.

And then I take those thumbnails and do a more thought out version digitally.

K: Wow, these are both beautiful. If you don't share these with patrons already, I would! I also like that you've given each one their own color, a good way to organize!

D: Thank you! I'll make sure to share these, I forget about them genuinely. I'll diverge in two directions from here depending on need. If what I'm working on is simple, I hop straight into color. If it's going to be complicated, ie crazy armor, specific architecture, I will do a line pass first and then launch into color. Either way, this is where most of my references come into play. Once that is solid I add detail work.

K: Reference can be so important in art; it really can bring work to a new level if used properly!

D: Yeah reference is king. I use it constantly, even when doing the most stylized thing, cause there's always stuff you forget. The waves I did for my last card, I had reference of barrel waves up constantly, and it helps a ton.

K: My last question is where do you see yourself in five years? I know this can be a challenging question, but if you had any goals or plans you’d like to see come into fruition, what would they be?

D: Five years? These questions are always a struggle for me. I try not to look past a week at a time because it's all so BIG. And my life has undergone so many huge changes in such a short period of time SO MANY times that it's hard to make long term plans. Especially when dealing with mental illness. So I try to think less about where I'll be in any amount of time, and more about what I want to progress towards achieving, it's a little easier and sets up less expectation. So this is not necessarily a five year plan, and more an eventual future plan. I want to have enough tutorial work to put together an art resources book/pdf online. I want to develop my freelance work further and create my own studio, ideally for illustrative style work, smaller animations, and maybe some classes for people interested in color and storytelling. I want to put together a small guide of sorts also for artists and people who need healing, since there's so many of us. That one is harder because it's an amorphous subject, but I think there's a lot of room for commentary there and a lot of people wanting to hear it, and I think it'll have to come from all those hurting. It's just a matter of how we'll organize that.I am a huge sap. That's my way. So in 5 years I'm hoping I'll be a better and more helpful sap.

K: Well, I hope you're able to make a lot of this happen, we need more empathy and help in the world. Thank you again Daphne for your time, this was really informative and an honest interview which I know others will appreciate.

D: Thank you, Kallie!

You can find more of Daphne’s beautiful works (and tutorials) here:

Patreon

Twitter

Tumblr

304 notes · View notes

thesinglesjukebox · 5 years

Video

youtube

CHARLY BLISS - CAPACITY

[7.00]

Their last one was [6.90], so Charly Bliss may not yet have reached their capacity...

Katherine St Asaph: My suspicion that Young Enough is going to sophomore-slump hard and laboredly is at war with the thrilling, buzzing joy that's suffused every venue I've seen them play, and also with what feels like several weeks straight of "I'm at capacity, I'm spilling out of me" being an earworm. And also, perhaps the subconscious cause: my current millennially burned out state of needing to have a full-time job, plus a side job, plus freelance writing, plus an ill-fated attempt to learn real analysis at the same time (please especially don't try this), plus a pile of grovercode needing turned into a presentable product in a week (or this), plus a dwindling social life, plus not dying, plus the knowledge that even all this isn't stopping the rest of the world from lapping me on every axis. "A couple of things is enough": what a great fantasy. [7]

Ryo Miyauchi: "Capacity" captures the awkwardness in the process of transition. Hissing drum-machine ticks and bleeding Casio notes that sound inspired by early Rilo Kiley stick out of Charly Bliss's usual get-up like new accessories on an outfit during a trial period, but those new add-ons move the band's music into a slightly later era of indie-rock without overtly messing with the "bubblegrunge" of the last record. As the music shifts in tone, so does Eva Hendricks, who seem less sardonic not just through her more paced delivery but also her more matter-of-fact lyrics. [6]

Ian Mathers: Sometimes it feels like me and everyone I know are still sentimental, anxious kids and what is "sometimes nothing is delicious" but Mulaney's "in terms of instant relief, cancelling plans is like heroin" with a starker anhedonia? But I think the restless buzz of "Capacity", coating the surprisingly steady, sturdy song structure, would appeal even if it didn't touch the exposed nerve of this week's minor breakdown quite so hard (but it does that, too). It's still early in the year, not too late to try for "Sever every microscopic atom of connection to / 'I can barely keep myself afloat when I'm not saving you'" as a personal resolution. [9]

Joshua Minsoo Kim: Musically, it's less exciting than what Charly Bliss have provided in the past. But more than that, it's the song's lack of development and dynamic range that turns "Capacity" into a frustrating listen. There's bright synth arpeggios and pounding drums but they're part of an arid musical landscape that sucks the life out of everything -- even Hendricks's idiosyncratic voice sounds anonymous here. The toplines are solid, though, so I'm still holding out hope for Young Enough. [5]

Alex Clifton: I feel like Emily Haines comparisons are inevitable; Eva Hendricks shares her gift of a bright, clear voice that glides. Halfway through the song it begins to swallow itself and even my usual songwriting kryptonite (contrapuntal melodies sung by the same person) doesn't manage to hold my attention as it might in other circumstances. [5]

Alfred Soto: Not until the second half with the addition of shiny, basic guitar lines does it exceed its minimal capacity. Before that moment, the synth arpeggio and Eva Hendricks' voice harmonize too well: cutely, in places mawkishly. Yet it coheres, if not at the level of "Percolator." [6]

Joshua Copperman: "Capacity" features a stock drum loop, an almost wholly synthetic backdrop, and a trebly, over-processed main vocal. "Capacity" also rhymes "me" with "me," and "wrong" and "wrong." Anyone more attuned to 'authentic music' will be irritated to no end, but that might be the point. The music perfectly mirrors the inability to make everyone happy, leaving all parties unfulfilled and unsure where their priorities lie. In the way "Capacity" alienates everyone musically and lyrically, the song becomes more relatable. There are hints of embracing the burnout in the lyrics, but the music completes the anti-people-pleasing message. Anyone talking about burnout (except for Anne Helen Petersen) just sounds like the ear-piercing sonics of this song to those that don't understand. Too many bands pivot to synth pop in order to be more accessible, but true to their songs' message, Charly Bliss intentionally please no one but themselves. [8]

Iris Xie: While Ava Max tries to fake meaningfulness with "So Am I" and Julia Michaels and Selena Gomez are insincere about their experiences with "Anxiety" -- Charly Bliss actually does the work of making art that communicates what it is like to recover from the dark, twisted anxiety of people pleasing, while dropping a latticework of references to that lived experience. When Eva Hendricks snarls "desecrated and complacent," when she rises in elation with about being a "sentimental, anxious kid," I wince in recognition. How have my own experiences of being mistreated, combined with overthinking and settling for crumbs, created maladaptive coping mechanisms where I people pleased and operated from my insecurities? The past few months have been full of being honest with myself on new levels -- I realized that absolutely no one in my current life wants me to be at capacity at all, and they are all rooting for my genuine happiness. Amazingly, "Capacity" embodies a significant part of that experience. Amongst fuzzed guitars and vibrant chimes that oscillate between warmth, danger, and concern, the pre-chorus is electrifying in its construction: "Sever every microscopic atom of connection to / "I can barely keep myself afloat when I'm not saving you." The melody's quiet, stirring confidence repeats itself in the hook, "I'm at capacity, I'm spilling out of me / It's got nothing to do with me." When Hendricks sings this, it is with a searing mix of joy, resignation, and defiance, and is reminiscent of being high on hope, as seen in Grimes' "Artangels" and Perfume's "Fushizen Na Girl." When I sing along to the hook, and I hear that little thunderclap of drums that affirm the shaking epiphany, I feel simultaneously elated and "god, fuck it, why was it like this?" But it's okay. Releasing old survival mechanisms that no longer serve me, with the help of therapy and support networks, has helped me understand an important truth. I no longer need to embody old roles that use overextended selflessness as false ways of receiving the self-love that truly, only I can give myself. Therefore, "Capacity" represents the sunniness rising from a relentless miasma, and the work it takes to figure out what your true capacity is. [8]

Vikram Joseph: Living one's best life is a phrase that a few of us might have used on occasion over the last couple of years - probably with a sense of humorous detachment, but also, almost certainly, with a kind of low-key reverence for the concept, which is, surely, the absolute platonic ideal of existence, right? It's easily confused, by me at least, with doing as many things as possible all at once; trying to keep myself and everyone else happy and to find comfort in the happy exhaustion of filling almost every evening and weekend with plans, and yet never shaking off the sensation that I'm still not doing enough, not meeting enough people, not living well enough. Fortunate, then, that I've been blessed in recent weeks with two extremely relatable songs on the subject - Alex Lahey's excellent "Don't Be So Hard On Yourself", and this (even better) Charly Bliss single. Transitioning from the salt-spray power-pop of their debut album to rich bubblegum pop, it's a hooky, summery self-care anthem cushioned by dense, foamy pillows of synths. And it culminates in a spectacular two-chord (it's rare to hear the old I-IV sound so climactic, or so well-earned) middle eight which must be the most ecstatic-sounding bonfire of anxieties I've heard in ages. "I was raised an East Coast witch / like doing nothing's sacrilegious / triple overtime ambitious / sometimes nothing is delicious," Eva Hendricks sings in her wonderful, weightless helium howl, that last line sounding like a revelation. Maybe 2019 is the year of doing less! Probably not, though. [9]

[Read, comment and vote on The Singles Jukebox]

#Charly Bliss #indie rock #music #music review #writing

1 note · View note

laularlau8 · 7 years

Photo

‘Success couldn’t fix our insecurity’: Gillian Anderson and best friend Jennifer Nadel on why they’ve written a ‘manual for life’

Who do you turn to when you’re struggling to cope? After counselling each other when the going got tough, Gillian Anderson and her close friend Jennifer Nadel have written a tried-and-tested ‘manual for life’ on the issues that affect us all

Ten years ago, Gillian Anderson met Jennifer Nadel, a neighbour in West London’s Notting Hill, and, sensing a kindred spirit, made that classic mummy mistake of thinking how lovely it would be if their children could be friends. They arranged to meet at a local café, where Gillian’s 12-year-old daughter Piper and Jennifer’s 13-year-old son Jack sat in stony silence. ‘They just didn’t get along,’ laughs Gillian. ‘We took a stroll through Hyde Park and they shuffled along, saying absolutely nothing. It was hideous.’‘But we ended up being friends, which was the blessing,’ says Jennifer. Gillian nods in agreement as she sips coffee.

The star of The X-Files and The Fall has turned up to the YOU photo shoot in tight-fitting black jeans and dizzying stilettos, looking immaculate even though she is about to go into hair and make-up. For the first few minutes she’s glued to her phone, sending anxious texts. The premiere of her new film, Viceroy’s House (a drama set during the partition of India, which opens on Friday), has changed, ‘so I’m trying to work out how to get my kids home from swimming’. Jennifer arrives late to many hugs and greetings in a big, curly wool jacket, colourful necklace and chunky rings.

From their first conversation – one that has never really finished – Gillian and Jennifer realised they had a huge amount in common. Not just a shared sense of humour, but also of having dealt with pretty much everything life could throw at them: a fractured childhood, broken relationships, being a single parent, serious illness in the family, money worries, depression, anxiety and a creeping sense of insecurity that seemed impossible to shake off.

They became each another’s go-to adviser when things got tough.Now they have distilled their thoughts and experiences into a manual for life. We: A Manifesto for Women Everywhere might sound grandiose, but it is a practical guide to getting to know yourself, your strengths and weaknesses, and learning to cope in a world that sometimes seems overwhelming, even if you are beautiful and successful. ‘This book doesn’t come from lofty heights,’ as they say in the introduction. ‘It comes from two friends who have stumbled along together, trying, failing, crying, laughing, learning and trying again.’

It seems incredible that two such able and successful women could feel so unsure of themselves, but no one is immune to stress and anxiety. Gillian, 48, says she suffered daily panic attacks when she first became famous as FBI Special Agent Dana Scully in The X-Files. Jennifer, 54, suffered a breakdown – ‘a glorious, full-blown burnout’ – when she was home affairs editor at ITN. From the outside, both had enviable lives but ‘no amount of external success could fix the way we felt inside…it made us feel guilty that even with the gifts and luck we’d been given we couldn’t make life work’.

Their recipe for finding peace of mind includes reflection, meditation and self-examination – looking at where your problems come from and how to fix them, without resorting to alcohol, drugs, work, food or abusive relationships, as they have done at times: ‘You name it, we tried it,’ they write.

Between them, they have clocked up many hours of therapy and distilled the best of what they have learnt into nine ‘principles’: honesty, acceptance, kindness, courage, trust, peace, humility, love and joy. Their aim is to get women working through the principles not just as individuals, but in groups that will use their new-found strength to campaign against injustice and create a more compassionate world.

‘It’s about women coming together to share troubles and joys without feeling we are in competition,’ says Gillian. ‘There are so many fundamental things we have in common. Who isn’t horrified by rising suicide rates among teenagers, the degree of self-harm and the impact social media is having on women of all ages?’

Gillian’s daughter Piper, now 22, is ‘quite grounded’, she says, but that’s partly due to luck. ‘There are times when I’ve gone waxing on about something or other and times when I’ve just let her be. She’s very self-aware, reflective and honest, so the good stuff must have had some impact, although I’m sure there’s plenty of negative stuff that’s been passed down as well.’

By contrast, both her and Jennifer’s early years were blighted by depression and anxiety. Jennifer first had therapy aged 15: ‘I beat you, I was 14!’ chips in Gillian. Jennifer grew up in an eccentric, alcoholic household in the English countryside with a very young mother and a reclusive, academic father. The house was divided into a children’s half and an adults’ half, and visits between the two were regulated.

Gillian’s upbringing was more conventional, but perhaps moving around unsettled her: she was born in Chicago, but her parents soon moved to Puerto Rico, then London – where they stayed until she was 11 – before settling in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Aged 13, she ceased to be an only child when her brother Aaron was born (he had neurofibromatosis, a congenital condition that causes tumours to grow on the nervous system), followed by a sister, Zoe.

Gillian says there was ‘a lot of stuff to deal with’ in her childhood. She went off the rails, became a punk, dyed her hair, experimented with drugs and was voted ‘girl most likely to be arrested’ by her classmates – and actually was arrested and charged with trespass on the night of her graduation for trying to break into her school. ‘There was a point where it was highly recommended that I see a therapist because I was struggling in school. I guess that was the beginning of self-reflection and looking at behaviour patterns and historical stuff.’

Gillian’s father, who ran a film production company, tried to persuade her away from acting, or to at least learn word processing (her mother was a computer programmer), so she could earn money in the down times. ‘Good advice, but I didn’t listen,’ she says.

Instead Gillian moved to New York and worked as a waitress between theatre roles until she was cast in The X-Files, aged 24. She thought it would run for 13 episodes. Instead, it dominated the next ten years of her life. She met her first husband, Piper’s father Clyde Klotz, on set (he was assistant art director).

Having therapy as a teenager helped Gillian cope with fame, but she still felt overwhelmed at times. ‘There were occasions during that series when I wasn’t sure whether I could go on. I started having panic attacks on a daily basis while we were shooting, around the time Piper was born. It was a mixture of not having dealt with childhood problems, the work being intensive, living in the spotlight and the expectation on me, as well as not knowing how to get balance or properly take care of myself. The panic attacks forced me to start practising meditation, just to eke out a tiny bit of space for myself, and that made it possible to continue.’ Gillian and Clyde divorced after three years (she later said she had been too young and has encouraged her daughter to travel and ‘make the most of her life’ before getting seriously involved with a man), and she was briefly married to Julian Ozanne, a filmmaker. She then fell in love with Mark Griffiths, a businessman, with whom she has two sons, Oscar, ten, and Felix, eight.

Despite achieving fame on both sides of the Atlantic, she remained insecure: ‘For years I was very self-centred and focused on my body, my weight, and it caused so much sadness. That really moves me now, just how much of my younger life I missed out on because I was so focused on my thighs or my outfit; it was such a waste of time.’

Obsessing about appearance is part of the career she chose, Gillian concedes, ‘but it’s becoming the world we all operate in because of social media. Facebook and Instagram have made all women focus on how they look and how they’re represented.’Jennifer agrees: ‘If we get a knock in life we rationalise it by telling ourselves we’re not good enough or pretty enough, and that’s a form of self-harm. You wouldn’t talk to your child or someone you love like that and yet that’s how we talk to ourselves, almost automatically.’

Jennifer, who is on her second marriage and has three sons (Jack, 23, Theo, 21, and Arlo, seven), channelled her teenage woes into academic success: she trained as a barrister, then swapped to journalism, spending five years as a senior correspondent at ITN.

Television was almost as demanding as acting in terms of appearance and long hours. ‘I felt obliged to don the uniform – power suit and heels – that my editor and the industry expected. I felt trapped. One morning I woke up and realised I couldn’t go on. I called the news desk and said I was very sorry but I couldn’t come in – not that day and, as it turned out, not ever.’ Jennifer was diagnosed with severe depression which dogged her for the next ten years. ‘I never thought I would work again.’

Motherhood brought its own pressures, especially for Gillian, who finds the noise and chaos of young boys unbearable at times. Maybe other mothers have ‘tougher nerve endings’, she says. She does the ‘right thing’ and gets down to play Lego but ‘my kids can sense it’s not easy for me. I struggled when Piper was little as well. I remember getting restless and feeling this pressure that I should be doing something else, but when I was doing something else feeling this pressure that I should be with my child. It’s that constant tug of war…and I don’t think I’m alone with that. I try to be tolerant and patient. How I am in the house depends on my time of the month: I’m either embracing of the noise or it’s nails on a chalk board. But they know that it’s just Mum. There’s an acceptance and a lovingness.’

There are 12 years between Piper and Oscar, so Gillian’s daughter was an only child for almost as long as she was. ‘I don’t think anything is accidental in life. It wasn’t on purpose but it’s ironic,’ she says.Is there some advantage to having a spell as an only child? ‘I’m not so sure. It was really important to me that Oscar had [another] sibling because Piper felt like an only child, Oscar’s dad was an only child and I didn’t want to repeat that with Oscar. So his relationship with his brother is something new to me. I’ve never observed similar-age sibling relationships before and it’s really fascinating and beautiful. 'Independence-wise being an only child is good, but there are traits that I have seen in other only children: being quite selfish, not really wanting to share. It’s taken a long time for me to push the boundaries of those and be less controlling, less protective of my world and my space.

Relationships with men have been no easier. Jennifer had a ‘horrible’ divorce from her first husband, which was ‘incredibly messy and painful and took many years to recover from, although looking back I can see how it led to transformation. I had to learn to love in the face of anger.’Gillian saw a pattern with her partners: ‘I’d meet someone, instantly fall in love and spend every waking hour with them, but stopped doing the things I enjoyed doing, stopped taking care of myself. I adopted their interests, friends, music, tastes…before long I’d start to resent them, even though it was me who actively let myself go.’

After six years together, she and Mark split up (they didn’t marry) and she has used some of the experience of her dealings with her ex in her book. ‘A spiritual adviser encouraged me to start thinking of [him] as my “beloved”, that regardless of our separateness we will be raising two children together for the rest of our lives and that makes him one of the most important people in my life, whether I like it or not. As you can imagine, this is not easy, but the times I am able to communicate with him from a place of love and appreciation rather than resentment, or as he says “againstness”, the more my perception shifts.

Gillian and Jennifer’s book, We, asks its readers to work through a series of exercises designed to shift their own perceptions. The first is gratitude. Though it seems simple – too simple almost – taking a look at your life and writing a list of things to be grateful for can be transforming however low, angry or despondent you feel, they say. The next is gentleness, the simple act of being kind to yourself. You’re not perfect: don’t dwell on little slip-ups, and banish the self-criticism.

Meditate. This is a tough one: Jennifer says when she first had a go, it ‘felt like I was being put in a torture chamber’. She and Gillian suggest making a quiet space for yourself, with fresh flowers or a candle nearby, but once meditating becomes a habit it gets easier. ‘I had to be facing in the right direction, there could be no distractions, the candle and incense lit, my legs crossed,’ says Gillian. ‘Then at one point I was away working and had none of my usual crutches. Now I can do it anywhere – in a crowd, on a bus, at work.’

All this is preparation for working through the nine principles, which are designed to guide you to a place of ‘acceptance’, where you can switch the spotlight from yourself to the problems of the wider world. They include a guide to choosing a cause close to your heart that you could support or campaign around.Jennifer stood as a candidate for the Green Party in the last general election and is a trustee of Inquest, a charity that supports families of people who have died in custody. At ITN she covered miscarriages of justice and visited prisons: ‘It gave me a harrowing insight into the powerlessness of being incarcerated wrongly and not being able to get anyone to believe you.’

Gillian styles herself on Twitter as ‘Mum, actress, activist’ and has campaigned for women’s and children’s rights (including her own: she made it public last year that she had been offered half as much money as her male co-star for an X-Files revival, a situation that was eventually remedied). She recently spoke at Davos about trafficking and modern slavery: ‘the thing that breaks my heart’.If it all sounds too earnest, remember that one of the principles in We is joy. ‘There have been times when the knocks have felt so hard and all-consuming that I’ve struggled to smile or to laugh, but it’s possible to break through that,’ says Gillian. ‘I try not to chew over or hold on to arguments, make space to lighten things – though, I have to admit, life situations come regularly where I think, “What! This can’t play out like this, are you kidding me?” I forget that I can’t control everything.’So reaching that place of acceptance, even for them, is a work in progress? ‘Absolutely,’ says Jennifer.‘Ongoing,’ says Gillian. ‘Every day.’

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/home/you/article-4245374/Interview-Gillian-Anderson-friend-Jennifer-Nadel.html#ixzz4ZkIKobPHFollow us: @MailOnline on Twitter | DailyMail on Facebook

#gillian anderson #jennifer nadal #we #interview

281 notes · View notes