“I wish I could tell my younger self that…”

Life lessons If we could go back in time and pass on career advice to our younger selves, what would we say? Ruth Hamilton asked four leading artists this very question – and their replies might help you right now

- Ruth Hamilton

1 Everybody wings it sometimes (and that’s absolutely fine)

When she first started out, digital artist and character designer Loish struggled with Impostor Syndrome; feeling like everyone else knew exactly what they were doing and had fully mastered their skills. But she eventually realized that learning as you go along is no bad thing.

“A lot of people are just doing the best they can and adapting to different situations in life and in their career,” she says. “What helped me was to just jump in and wing it, and always do the best I could – and accept that this was enough. I usually had more skills than I thought I did, and also an ability to adapt and learn new skills based on the situation.”

2 Life experiences will feed into your creative output

“Building upon your knowledge of unrelated subjects contributes a ton to your growth, both as an artist and as a person,” says creative director and concept artist Finnian MacManus, whose time spent travelling helped define his artistic style and continues to shape his work today. “The more you can absorb from the world that you’re passionate about and then bring back into you art, the better.”