A Second Life in Lines
At Blackbird Farm, former tax lawyer Jane Stephens has built a quieter career around birds, ink and the usefulness of leaving certain things unexplained.
Did you always draw?
Yes, but for a long time drawing occupied the margins: envelopes, meeting papers and the backs of documents that should probably have been retained. I did not think of it as a career until quite late.
Was leaving the law a dramatic decision?
Not at all. Dramatic decisions are usually expensive. I reduced the legal work gradually and increased the drawing until one became the interruption to the other. The rabies campaign was the turning point: it came through an old public-sector connection, but I still had to win the work. That was when illustration first felt like a profession rather than a private habit.
What did the law teach you about illustration?
That clarity and simplicity are not the same thing. A clear image can contain ambiguity; it simply has to be ambiguous in the intended place.
Why Blackbird Farm?
The name existed before I arrived, although the blackbirds behave as if they negotiated it personally. It is quiet enough to work and not so quiet that one starts inventing noises.
Your animals often appear to know more than the viewer.
That is because they usually do. The viewer has only just arrived.
What would you like people to take from Beyond Nature?
A slightly increased suspicion of birds—and perhaps a drawing, if they have come prepared.
Interview edited for length and clarity.
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