DOWN THE GARDEN PATH

TILDA SWINTON has spent more than three decades on the big screen a feat she insists is entirely accidentdal. She sits down with Harpers Bazaar Australia to talk about her lost poetry her spiritital home and her eternal gathering of a creative tribe.

- GRACE O'NEILL

By the time you're reading this, Tilda Swinton may have already touched down in Australia. Bur today we're in London. It's a classic September morning-the weather tiptoeing between blue-eyed clarity and the looming threat of rain and Swinton is being overwhelmed by a firework of fems. Her face, as distinctive and recognizable as any in the annals of Hollywood history, is set in a serene, studied stare, but when the carnera stops clicking, she breaks, turning to photographer Sølve Sundsbø and her long-time stylist, Jerry Stafford. "Is this getting a bit too bracken-y?" she asks. They study the monitor, consider that the shot 1nay indeed be too bracken-y, and adjust accordingly.

This is Tilda Swinron's happy place. Where some actors find the rigmarole of photoshoots a tedious but necessary part of their day job, Swinton views it as another creative playground-a place to have a caper with her favourite collaborators. "I mean, these are my friends," she says once we've wrapped shooting, sipping on a freshly brewed cup of tea. "Maybe this reveals something about how unwired I am in terms of not thinking too much about acting, but for me, photoshoots are not dissimilar to making films. It's that idea of making the frame; it's very much a narrative."

"Collaboration" is the word that comes up most often in our conversation. The Oscar-winner, whose remarkable career has encompassed everything from British art house to the Marvel cinematic universe, is powered almost entirely by the charge of collaborative energy. Rather than chase clout, paychecks or awards, Swinton seeks kindred creative spirits, and when she finds them, she works with them again and again. It's a fact that jumps out immediately when you look at the directors who appear m her filrnography: she has done four films apiece with Jim Jarmusch, Luca Guadagnino, and Wes Anderson, with another one for the latter currently in post-production.