Karl Lilje Biography

I was born a naughty and hyperactive child in a little town in South Africa. Luckily ADD was not in fashion then so instead of being medicated to conformancy I spent my sugar energy exploring books and taking apart almost everything, including a very old punch card computer, a model car, and an old camera.

Like all children I was an artist but I did not stop. I taught myself how to teach myself and then it became easy to teach myself computers, art, photography, and many other things like the meaning of life and how brains work.

At age 12 I watched Star Wars and it changed my life. I knew I had to do this too. I taught myself how to program a computer, and fell in love with digital art and animation, although in those days software was scarce and expensive so I had to make my own. I loved using one medium to influence the other, and I created a style of art I called Pixelism by painting very low resolution computer generated images.

At age 13 I discovered girls and went from being a straight A student to a completely artistic broody teenager, which I felt was an improvement.

Unfortunately at this time in South Africa apartheid was in effect, with many international restrictions, so there were no 3D colleges, or hardly any information on cinema at all (this being before Internet).

After graduating from design college (which I hated passionately) I went to work laying out magazines, and then worked for a clothing company. I fell into computer programming for real-time animation, and went to work for the University of Cape Town on a virtual reality project, where I programmed tools, physics, and modeled and textured some characters. Then I studied philosophy quite seriously and graduated a happier person.

On a trip to the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam I saw a little old lady stand for ages and ages in a long queue, eventually cry when she saw The Milkmaid... I realised this is what I want to do with my life - make little old ladies cry.

Now I work freelance and sell art and software online, photograph models and amazing couture, write short stories, tutor artists... and love every minute of it.