Festive Flavours, December 2024 – iPad drawing
The Gallery
Click on an image to find out the story behind it – for best effect, enter ‘full screen’ mode. All images have been created using an iPad.
Interview with the Artist
Angela Nilsen has had a long and successful career as a food writer and editor, and been a Guild member for around 30 years. She is based in an idyllic thatched cottage in rural Essex, where she juggles a wide range of talents and interests.
Apparently these illustrations were all done on an iPad. How does that work – and why use the iPad?
Think of the iPad screen as a blank canvas or page in a sketchbook – and a drawing app (I use Procreate) as your toolkit. Open up the app and you will find a myriad of art supplies for you to play and experiment with.
The only physical tool needed to make use of all the brushes, pencils, charcoals, paints, crayons, inks, paper, pencils, etc contained in the app is an Apple pencil to draw on screen with.
I chose the iPad to do all these drawings on a) for continuity, and b) because I like the way surprises in the drawings can suddenly appear.
I can click on something and the image may change in a way I hadn’t considered, which can send the drawing in a completely different direction. The app allows me to work in layers too which gives more flexibility. If I want to add text, for example, I set up a text box on a separate layer to the drawing. This allows me to try different typefaces in different sizes and colours, and to change my mind if it isn’t working by simply deleting it without affecting the rest of the drawing.
In a sense, it’s the opposite of watercolour, where once a brushstroke is made, it’s there for good.
After you have come up with an image of what you want to draw, how do you get that from your head onto the iPad?
That’s hard to explain in a few words. As it involves technology, it definitely helped me initially to have some tuition on the basics of the Procreate app, so I could get to grips with this different art form.
What comes into my head first could be an image or an idea, and anything can spark that – perhaps something I’ve seen online, in a magazine, sitting on the Tube, or a chance remark I’ve heard. As I like to have something to work from, I’ll research reference photos or find real items I can set up for a composition.
The next stage is to get something, anything, down on the screen so the drawing can start to develop. My immediate instinct is to check and question things as I draw, a bit like writing a food article. For a drawing though it’s more about – is the composition working, am I using the best tool, how about my choice of colours? Is there enough variety of shape and tone? Is the drawing interesting and relevant, tasty or eye-catching enough to warrant its position at the top of the newsletter? But it’s when I let the questioning in my head go, and allow playful intuition to take over, that the drawing really starts to happen.
You are probably most famous for being food editor at BBC Good Food. Spin us through your food writing career.
After training as a teacher of cooking, then teaching in a school for a year, I moved swiftly into a different way of working with food.
I was offered a job in London with the food company Van den Berghs (then a division of Unilever). During the interview it was like a light switch went on. I was told the job would be about creating recipes, testing the company’s product, food styling, helping on commercials, writing and editing. I had no idea at the time that such a varied, creative and exciting job existed – and it set me on a new path. From there I went on to work mainly in publishing, with magazines and a newspaper, in the UK and North America (I lived in Canada for 14 years). Having that initial teacher training though has proved a great asset during different stages of my career – whether it was teaching at cooking schools or demonstrating at the Good Food Show.
I feel grateful that because of the creativity involved, my jobs have never really felt like work to me. A highlight after returning from Canada to the UK was becoming food editor at BBC Good Food – and after 10 years there I was ready to spin around again and go freelance.
And books?
Yes, I’ve written a few – on an eclectic mix of topics ranging from baking and cake decorating, to healthy eating, to a guide on food terms, tools, techniques and ingredients (co-authored with fellow Guild member Jeni Wright).
The one I am most proud of however, is ‘The Ultimate Recipe Book’ (BBC Books). It is a compilation of ‘The Ultimate’ feature I wrote for Good Food magazine, where each month I took a classic dish and via innumerable recipe tests, experimentation and quizzing well-known chefs and other food writers, came up with an ‘ultimate’ version.
The icing on the cake was when I won two awards in the same year for the feature – the Glenfiddich Cookery Writer Award and the Guild of Food Writers’ Cookery Journalist Award.
Tell us how you got into art.
I didn’t take the art route at school, despite always wanting to be an artist. So when considering a career, going to art school wasn’t an option. Instead I chose food and over the years, sustained my desire for art by taking lots of arty evening classes, including photography, calligraphy, pottery, Chinese painting.
It was while living in Canada that I eventually made it to art school. I had taken a leave of absence from my food writing job with a Vancouver newspaper, to go travelling around Asia for six months. The trip inspired me to review things in my life, so about a year after my return to Canada, I made the sudden decision to go to art school for four years as a mature student. I supported myself by writing cookbooks, then returned to England hoping to find work. I came away from art school with a dream of one day being able to find a way to combine food and art.
And now I have.
And you’re also a photographer?
Yes I am, though having worked with many top food photographers in my career as a food writer, I would not put myself in the same category as them. But I have always loved composing photos and working with food photographers.
I did a brief course at art school, and have dipped in and out of other photo courses, included an online one that finally helped me grasp what f-stops and apertures were! This gave me more camera confidence once freelance to go on to food style, prop style and photograph some of my own features, as well as for others, including a full scale photoshoot for our ex-President Orlando’s website, which will be unveiled when his new book comes out in March.
Has your membership of the Guild been much use to you professionally, would you say?
Initially it was invaluable as a way of being able to meet and mix with fellow food writers, being part of a food community, making contacts, attending in-person events.
Membership took on a new meaning in 2021 when I put my name down for the Guild’s Mentorship Scheme. I was partnered with Becca Perl (aka The Adventurous Glutton) who had the same two interests as me, and over a year we mentored and supported each other in how we could best combine food with art.
To this end we both set ourselves a project. Mine was to create and have printed a set of food related greetings cards, Becca’s was to have her drawings published somehow. By the end of the year, we had both achieved our aims – and Becca has gone on to have more drawings published and to write and illustrate her own children’s book. So being a member of the Guild certainly came up trumps for both of us.
When did you start doing the illustrations for the newsletter, and how did that come about?
It was in 2022 – after having done the Guild mentorship. I was asked if I would like to come up with a seasonal drawing each month to give the newsletter an illustrative opener. It has been a great privilege to do that – and the Guild allows me a free rein. I appreciate that, as it really helps with the creative process when you are left to your own devices.
And members can buy some of them as greetings cards?
They can. The original sets of cards I created have almost sold out. But I have a new Christmas set, with a special offer for Guild members. They are available as a pack of 6 (3 festive designs, blank inside, each 15×10.5cm) including envelopes and with free delivery, at £12.50. For details, simply email me at: angelainthepond@gmail.com
Any suggestions for food writers who would like to develop their artistic side?
I do believe that if you want something enough you will find a way to achieve it. Up until fairly recently I found it hard to envisage how I was going to combine food with my art. All I knew was that I wanted to do that. So I think if you know that is what you want to happen, try to keep that thought alive and active in the back of your mind and keep finding ways to feed it. Then when opportunities arise for you to fulfil that desire – be open to them and grab them with both hands.
What does 2025 hold for you?
Lots more drawing – and looking forward to more food and art possibilities.
All Images copyright 2024 to Angela Nilsen and cannot be reproduced without express permission from the artist.