To view Tanya's Art Galleries, please click here now. Thank you and enjoy...

TANYA SAUNDERS's Biography...in her own words...

Hello Everyone: Welcome to my Wild & Colorful World!

My name is Tanya, and in between my job as an executive director of the African Environmental Film Foundation, I pursue my passion for photography and design. Over the years, I have designed a wide range of products from exclusive silk scarves and other fashion accessories & homewares, to products for Dezine Design's Wild Web Stores where I concentrate on merchandise with mass-market appeal. My work has taken me all over the world from Kenya (where I live) to the USA...

If you take a look at my artworks, you'll soon see that my main visual interests are color and shape, and my inspiration is drawn from the natural world. I believe this is my greatest strength as an artist/designer: drawing on Nature for inspiration, while creating designs that appeal to the mainstream consumer. My work also spans the age-groups, with a lot of images that make bright, fun prints and products for kids, and a more "grown-up" style for adults, much of which is suitable both for cheerful home decor and striking office art, especially when printed very large and beautifully framed or when printed on canvas.

My creative career began fifteen years ago, when I first started designing greeting cards for my stationery distribution company in Kenya, East Africa. During those years, my company became the region's dominant supplier of decorative social stationery products and related gift items, supplying both the local and tourist trade. As a result, I was also invited to take on corporate design contracts with international hotel groups and travel companies.

My then-fiancé and I spent a couple of years living in UK recently, during which time it quickly became clear that there was a much wider potential application for my designs across a multitude of product sectors than I had hitherto experienced. I began working on major projects on both sides of the Atlantic, and in my spare time, I would also do some design work for charity.

To trace the inspiration for my artwork is simple – I need look no further than my childhood, which was charmed in so many ways. Due to my father’s work as an internationally-acclaimed wildlife film-maker and dedicated conservationist, I had the unique privilege of growing up inside the Tsavo East National Park in Kenya. We had no garden and no fences, just our lovely wooden house looking out over Tsavo, which is a beautiful and rugged space the size of Switzerland. I grew up with elephants on my doorstep – literally (Take a look at the photos below if you don't believe me!). I did not have a dog or a cat or any other "normal" pets, but all the animals became my friends, from the tiny squirrels and brightly colored birds to the massive elephants and imperial lions. I wasn’t too keen on the buffalo though – they always frightened me as a child!

Some might say my brother and I “missed out” on all the conventional trappings of childhood (kindergarten and cartoons and TV), but instead we had the whole of Africa as our playground – when we were not being home-schooled by my mother (I did not go to a conventional school until I was seven), we were making up our own games, “swimming” in the waterhole that catered for thirsty lions and leopard by night, and elephants, zebra, giraffe and all manner of creatures by day… or we were out on some adventure with our father, being charged by rhinos or sitting still and quiet for hours on end while he waited for that perfect shot of the eagle / elephant / weaver bird / frog…I often wish that I could re-visit those days with the knowledge I now have, to feel again with adult emotions the freedom and peace and magic that I lived every day as a child. However, I do believe that these feelings of freedom and the love of Nature is noticeable in the more whimsical of my designs.

In Africa, you can’t help but drown in the colours – every shade and every hue of every color imaginable exists in Nature here – from the glittering brightness of the underwater life around the tropical reefs, to the white equatorial snows glistening atop Mt Kenya and Mt Kilimanjaro… Growing up surrounded by Nature like this, in all its glory, how can you not be affected by it? How can it not influence who you are and what you strive to be? How can you not feel the importance of preserving it, and looking after it so that it is still there for your own children to witness? It is for this reason that I maintain my strong belief in wildlife conservation across the world, and why I now work with the African Environmental Film Foundation, whose mandate is to make educational films about wildlife and environmental issues in Africa, and to distribute them, free of charge, across the continent in local languages.

Apart from my work with this educational charity, and my art, design and photography, my other interests include international travel, scuba diving, trekking and mountaineering (though not technical climbing), keeping fit, playing tennis and running (including marathons when I'm feeling just a little bit crazy!), reading and discussing 20th century history, politics and current affairs, and of course wildlife conservation and anything to do with animals!

Today I live with my husband in a magical place called Kulafumbi, bordering the Tsavo National Park in Kenya. We have lions, elephants and crocodiles as neighbors and the closest city is over 200 miles away. We think it's paradise. You can keep up with the daily comings and goings of the wildlife living around my home and office in my online photo-journal: My Kenyan Wilderness Diary.

I continue to be mesmerized by the natural world, both here and abroad, and this is what continues to shape my creative drive. As such, my artwork becomes a reflection of me: inspired by Nature and captivated by its magical range of shape and color.

To view Tanya's Art Galleries, please click here now. Thank you and enjoy...