Our #TACA mentors are professionals from the creative industries, living with TS themselves, and they are volunteering their time, feedback, expertise and passion for the arts to the #TACA. They’ll be looking at every single piece of art that comes in.
Selecting entries to exhibit in the Winners Gallery won’t be easy, as there are thousands of talented people out there. Our mentors will make sure that each entry has met the guidelines, and they will then use a specially developed scoring system to find the entries to fill the #TACA gallery.
Terrina is a freelance artist from Redditch in the West Midlands. She uses a unique style of patterns to create her art. This came about when Terrina was 21. She works with uncontrollable tics that create the lines, dots and scribbles, and she uses this to raise awareness of Tourette's through her art.
As a result of her unique style Terrina has been involved with a growing number of televised and media interviews to show that there is no reason to be held back because of TS. Being a mentor for the #TACA is a perfect opportunity to prove to herself that she can do anything.
Terrina is hoping to see a love of art from the submissions that come in, along with a range of styles and visions, but more than anything she wants to encourage everyone to just have fun!
Paul is an award winning photographer, who has late onset full blown Tourette's syndrome plus, which started out of the blue a decade ago. He has found that he gets some respite and great fulfilment through helping others. He uses his unique position to raise awareness and offers empathy and solidarity to many young people who are struggling with their diagnosis.
Through his public speaking and TV and radio appearances, Paul seeks to raise awareness of Tourette's, increase acceptance and reduce discrimination. Paul is an advocate for Tourettes Action, Tic & Hull Yorkshire, Tourettes Scotland, Tourette Lifelong Care and Tourette Roma.
He is looking forward to being a #TACA mentor and seeing, first-hand, a range of visual arts pieces created by talented young people from across the UK.
Adam is a BAFTA award-winning composer, producer, and songwriter originally from South Wales. A founder member of hip-hop collective Arkane, he also released material under his Mr Ronz moniker. Described by Hip-Hop Connection as “DJ Shadow level cinematic with added humanity”, the A War Of Nerves album was one of Huw Stephens’ albums of the year on BBC Radio 1.
After writing the title song for the movie KiDULTHOOD he’s gone to work on a slew of TV and Film projects for companies like BBC, ITV, Channel 4 and A&E - including winning a Best Original Music BAFTA for his score to BBC’s Baker Boys and co-writing the title track for the video game Overcooked! which has currently clocked up over 90m streams.
As a pop writer and producer, Adam has appeared at Glastonbury Festival and live in session on WSM in Nashville and BBC Radio 2. He’s currently working on a new, as-yet untitled project.
Lauren is a 21-year-old small business owner, who sells her artwork to raise money for Tourettes Action and the National Neurodiversity Youth Council. Over the last couple of years, she has raised nearly £2000 selling her artwork.
Lauren has had simple tics from childhood, but these went unnoticed and undiagnosed until she was 17, when her tics exacerbated after a traumatic event. She struggled a lot with her tics and other neurological symptoms at first, but soon found that painting and music gave her some relief from it all. Now she runs her successful business, 'Aesthetic Tourettic' and strives to raise awareness of Tourette's with every piece she creates.
Lauren also does a lot of neurodiversity advocacy, both in person at conferences and schools, and online on platforms such as TikTok and Instagram. She has appeared in newspapers, on the radio and on TV raising awareness of the reality of bartending and being a pub landlady with Tourette's, and the benefits of creativity for Neurodivergent individuals.
Lauren is super excited to see all the amazing submissions that are sent in and hopes that more ticcy people can discover a love of art and it's therapeutic benefits through the #TACA!
Sam is a magician, comedian & ventriloquist based in East Sussex. His interest in magic started at the age of 4. Since then, Sam’s passion for the performing arts has only grown stronger. He has performed multiple one man shows, featured as the lead comic role in pantomime and also made it to the Semi-finals of Britain’s Got Talent with his loveable puppet, Baby Leo. More recently Sam was featured in the hit US TV show “Magic Caught On Camera".
Sam was diagnosed with TS at the age of 9 and has always tried to spread awareness for the positive impact that creativity can have on people with TS.
Sam is absolutely delighted to have been asked to be a mentor for this year’s TACA event and is looking forward to seeing this year’s entries.
Luke’s an actor, writer, producer and director. He trained at the Liverpool Institute of Performing Arts, gaining an honours degree in Community & Applied Theatre. Since graduating he has taken the industry by storm by writing a musical set during World War Two called ‘The Silence Between Us’, raising awareness of mental health.
Luke has been on multiple theatre tours, including school pantomime, his biggest achievement to date is his show ‘What Makes Me Tic?’, raising awareness of Tourette Syndrome, a condition that Luke has. The show gives an insight to Tourette’s by using immersive theatre techniques. The show has been performed across the UK, Europe and USA.
Luke is regularly involved in local Tourette communities and he is deeply honoured to be part of the #TACA mentor team.
Tourettes Action has worked in England, Wales and Northern Ireland since 1981 and is the leading support, services and research charity for people with Tourette Syndrome (TS) and their families. The charity wants people with TS to receive the practical support and social acceptance they need to help them live their lives to the full. TS is an inherited, neurological condition, the key features of which are tics, involuntary and uncontrollable sounds and movements.
TS is a complex condition and a large number of people with the condition will also experience co-occurring features and conditions. It is estimated that TS affects one school child in every hundred and more than 300,000 children and adults in the UK live with the condition.
The charity’s main activities include:
