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Bio

Tipi is a multidisciplinary artist based in Hackney Wick. Through painting, street art, and sculpture, she explores the pass of time, identity, the pressures of contemporary life and what it means to live consciously.

Having grown up around art and antiques, Tipi is heavily influenced by the symbolism and artistry of antique art, Old Master paintings, 17th-century Vanitas, and South American pre-Columbian and colonial traditions. Her recent work reinterprets memento mori through contemporary cultural references, pop iconography, and postmodern spiritual symbolism.

Tipi holds a Master’s degree in Fine Arts and has exhibited across East London, where she continues to develop new bodies of work that bridge historical symbolism with contemporary life.

"My work reflects on the passing of time and the way we shape our sense of self in contemporary life, using symbolism as a visual language."

About my work

My current practice reinterprets the European vanitas and memento mori tradition through contemporary symbolism, using the passing of time as a lens to reflect on the way we live today. Drawing from the visual language of Old Master paintings, 17th-century vanitas, and spiritual iconography, I create works that place historical symbols in dialogue with the signs of contemporary existence, digital culture, self-image, desire, and identity.

Recurring motifs such as skulls, flowers, crowns, smartphones, and sacred symbols function as contemporary vanitas objects, questioning the values, distractions, and inherited ideas that shape modern life. Rather than approaching these themes as something dark, I use them as a point of clarity: a way to strip back illusion, ego, and external expectations in order to reveal what feels essential.

Alongside this, my work also explores memento vivere, the call to live consciously. Nature, colour, and symbolic gestures of growth and resilience become counterpoints to fragility, suggesting that an awareness of life’s limits can deepen presence, connection, and meaning.

By bringing historical symbolism into conversation with contemporary culture, I am interested in creating visual spaces for reflection, inviting viewers to question how they define themselves, what they value, and what it means to be fully alive in the time we are given.