who is qoifoog?

My Face Won't Come Together, digitally edited photograph, 2024

When Tanaya "Qoifoog" Quinn was in primary school, she used her spare time during her Friday spelling and maths tests to draw her own renditions of Terry Denton's illustrations from Andy Griffith's "Just!" book series. Her teacher told her that she had a "wicked sense of humour", so Tanaya kept doodling in her books through early high school until she got yelled at for drawing a flower in the margins of her science book and had any and all interest in art ruined. So much so she spent the majority of her art classes reading through the stockpile of TV Week magazines being kept as papier-mâché material instead of actually making any art.

She continued to doodle and draw fan art for her favourite TV shows, but kept it mostly hidden from view for many, many years (apart from that one time a silly ABC2/SBS2 crackship drawing made a blink-and-you'll-miss-it appearance on SBS2's The Feed) before a certain quiz show host somehow found one of her fan art doodles on Instagram and gave it a like. This one like gave Tanaya the massive spark and motivation she needed to keep drawing and to keep refining her style, and to not be so scared of sharing her work with others.

Since then, Tanaya has had her work enjoyed by the cast of shows such as Shaun Micallef's Mad As Hell, Pointless Australia, and The Cook Up with Adam Liaw, and has featured on the excellent online series VHS Revue. She is also now a qualified multi-disciplinary artist, having completed a Certificate IV and Diploma in Screen And Media (Film And Video Production), a Certifciate IV in Photography And Digital Imaging, and a Certificate III in Visual Arts - all through TAFE NSW.

As well as drawing people and things off the telly, Tanaya has apeared on the telly a few times and has proven to be an actor of incredible range, from playing a bored Q&A audience member on At Home With Julia, to a disgruntled Block contestant on The Joy Of Sets, all the way to playing a bored Q&A audience member (and then a flirty one about five seconds afterwards) on Wednesday Night Fever. She also appeared as a contender on and won her episode of Mastermind Australia, but that's by the by.

As for where the name "Qoifoog" came from? That was from the lineup of letters Tanaya had on her rack while she was playing Scrabble one time. She then took to using it as her screen name, and it stuck. Whoops.