ALISON JACKSON

When I am preparing my 'lookalike' photographs, I think about the character of the real people, because, if the photographs are going to be plausible, you have to convince the viewer that they could have happened.

Photography seduces us into thinking we can believe photographs, whereas we can't really believe that a picture can tell us any kind of truth at all.

When Princess Diana died, I couldn't understand why people were mourning her death in such an enormous, hysterical way when they didn't actually know her for real.

Photography acts as a teaser, suggesting we can know something that we can never know. And the more we can't obtain it, the more we want it.

I am very pro-royal. Britain without them would be a sadder place.

Because Bin Laden's culture doesn't permit the worship of images, they understand how powerful images are. We wouldn't have thought of creating a visual bomb. In a way, he's chopped down two iconic buildings, and used our very truth imagery, to express himself. It's fascinating... I mean, dreadful.

I'm not satirical in a traditional way. What I do is more about creating caricatures and cartoons. I am commentating on the nature of how we live through photography, and how you can twist an angle to create a different perception of a person.

I'd like to take more pictures of real celebrities. It would be fabulous to photograph Brad Pitt. He's so good-looking and just such a star.

Among other things, I use a Samsung mobile phone, a very bad quality video camera, and an old Olympus with extremely bad Sigma lenses.

I'm a contemporary artist and I show in art galleries and museums. I show a number of photographs and films, but I also make television programs, books and some appetizing, all with the same concept.

Finding the perfect lookalike to work with is crucial and a lengthy process. We have our regulars, but we also use social media all the time to find people. It's amazing who you can unearth on Twitter.

Warhol was the ultimate voyeur, constantly observing people through the lens. He watched and listened, but did not participate. Behind the camera, Warhol was in control.

I'm particularly interested in how you can't rely on your own perception.

I'm not really interested in the celebrity themselves. I'm interested in the perception of the celebrity.

I am fascinated by the Royal Family because they are shrouded in mystique, and the Queen, and to a certain extent William, represent fabulous blank canvases. I find the Prince of Wales less fascinating because he spills the beans and we know too much about him.

Art work is inconclusive. It opens your mind up. At least, that's what I hope it does. And advertising, using exactly the same photograph, closes things down. It makes it conclusive. It sells a product, and that is its primary function.

The only people I really hate are parking attendants.

There is a wall of myth around royals and A-list celebrities, and that makes us wonder what they are really like. We see them on magazine covers so often that we think we know them intimately, and we want to learn more. I like to burst that bubble a little.

You can watch a little bit of war from your nice living room - 30 seconds of what's going on in Syria - and when you've had enough, switch over to some celebrity programme. We live our life through screens and images in this way, and we don't know what is real or fake anymore. It doesn't matter.

Now celebrity has taken on a holy status all of its own, and we look to the stars to provide us with the transcendental experience that was once achieved through religion.

Celebrities do look different in real life from our images of them - there is a big gap. And that is what my work is about: the gap between the image and the celebrity themselves.

It's always difficult to see yourself as other people do, but I'm realistic about my appearance. I wasn't born with one of those pretty, pretty faces, so I've never been absorbed with the way I look. I just try to make the most of what I've got.

I think my parents had in mind that I would settle down at quite a young age, but I decided that being a housewife in a big country house wasn't for me.

Career-wise, I feel very lucky to have always been able to follow my creative path.

If you see everything through the lens, you are constantly composing pictures. I think in pictures; I don't think in text.