making of Dunny Bertie

We at Yatzer would never lie to our readers….TADO form an evil conspiration that has as a goal to end up with minimalism and all-white interiors and spread their evil colours in order to conquer earth!
Don’t say we didn’t advise you!
Mysteriously named as TADO, Mike and Kate are undoubtly one of the most promising artistic duets of recent times. As they say, they barely spent a day apart since they first met and they are slowly becoming a two-head creative! Having UK as their base, they don’t fear to experiment with illustration, toys, clothes, web and wallpaper design or sculpture. Their particular vision of the world has made them famous and a wide range of brands and magazines are constantly asking them for collaboration. Now, if you are interested in asking them to make a special creation for you, they say that are always open to cold heart cash, bribery, good food and offers of holidays!

Hungry for details, we had a very interesting interview with them, exclusively for the readers of Yatzer.

the making of Giant Dunny Bertie

final Dunny Bertie

Well Mike and Katie, how did everything start?
We met and began working together at University back in 2001. A tutor of ours suggested that we try collaborating on a project together and the rest is history as they say!
What are you currently working on?
We've just arrived back from the Pictoplasma conference in Berlin where we had an exhibition called The Private Panda Club - an exhibition of photos we took in collaboration with our friends Tom Jackson and Kipi Ka Popo. At the moment we're busy working on the website for the exhibition and trying to catch up on a month's worth of missed emails...
You are involved in many artistic disciplines. Which are the main differences between them and what do you enjoy the most of each one?
We count ourselves very lucky to be able to work across a really wide range of projects; we don’t really seem them as separate disciplines as such though. We really enjoy being able to apply our work across different mediums, so it’s hard to pick any favourites - we get bored very easily though so it’s good we don't stick to doing just one thing!

rainbow lily

Is there any connection between the moody weather of your country and the strong use of colour that is present at all of your creations?
Haha - good point - maybe there is some truth in that. We live in Sheffield, which while it has its good points, is a pretty grim place at times. We'd not really thought of that before but we'd probably agree that it’s a sub-conscious reaction to our weather!
Which are your inspirations?
We tend to get our inspiration from very every-day things. We're always discovering things we find funny on our travels or just a trip to the shops, whether its a funny looking dog or a snippet of conversation we over-hear. We tend not to do too much research unless we're drawing something that we want to be factually correct. The biggest inspiration to us is probably each other though - it’s very hard to get a creative block when there's two of you!

"banoffee peaks spring" vinyl sticker for the new domestic landscapes

Do you collect anything? Which are your favourite artists?
Yes. We collect a LOT of things! We collect a lot of toys, prints, and artwork. One of our current favourites is the Japanese artist Yukinori Dehara - we can't get enough of his work at the moment! We also seem to collect shoes, fish, bicycles and cars...
Can you tell us something about your future projects?
There are many things we are very excited about in the coming months. We have several new releases with Kidrobot lined up, and a very large collaboration with a shoe/sports company that we can't wait to launch in 2010. We're also making plans for a solo show in the US next year and some groundwork for where to take our 'Cannibal Funfair' series next...

sohuii panda

twangs trummer

lily woods

crochet gang

Alfie

Panda love

cannibal funfair