Brandi Milne
Words by Melissa Williams
Self-taught South Californian Brandi Milne creates art that is a mixture of ‘nice and yummy’ with a sprinkling of ‘scary and kinda creepy’ thrown in. Mynameis? speaks to her about growing up as an art-crazed kid, developing astyle and the joys of life...
Brandi Milne creates fantasy landscapes filled with smiley, floating fruits and candies. Joy and sadness breed intimately in dreamscapes of ice cream twirls and wise old animals. Childhood nostalgia and youthful joy can simultaneously overwhelm the viewers who are drawn into Milne’s creations. They are creations that are a truly exquisite combination of well-loved American imagery and a world known only to dreamers. The message of Milne’s art is remembrance – remembering who you are, the beautiful gems in human history and also the process of holding onto and protecting these precious moments in time with all of your strength.
Milne spent an enormous time drawing and painting as a little human. Most of her subject matter at this time was real fun kids’ stuff with a particular penchant for haunted houses, ghosts and goblins, as she recounts: ‘I remember drawing a lot of ugly kids and writing funny stories with my sister. We would both make a “book” (a story with illustrations) and then we’d read ‘em over and over, just laughing our butts off. That’s what I remember drawing when I was young, pretty ridiculous.’ From a very young age, Milne has had a very clear and powerful idea of what she believed to be successful illustrations. She was even a little obsessive about it: ‘I loved colouring books, my mom would keep a steady supply in the house for the four of us (my siblings and I), but I remember hating the illustrations with thin lines. I would darken them with black crayons, or tear ‘em out of the book. Something about bold lines deeply resonates with me.’
The FULL interview with BRANDI MILNE appears in issue 5 of Mynameis? magazine - click here to purchase your copy www.graphotism.com/Subscribe-Graphotism-or-MyNameIs-Magazine.74.0.html
