Figurative painter who studied art at Birmingham Polytechnic and in 1992 graduated from the University of Central England with a master’s in illustration. He showed widely in Britain, France and Japan. His work was included many times in the BP Portrait Award at the National Portrait Gallery. In 1994 it was commended and he gained the Travel Award, the resulting exhibition, Sayonara Pet: From Sunderland to Tokyo at the Nissan car factories, in 1995 touring from the Portrait Gallery to Aberdeen Art Gallery and Walsall Museum and Art Gallery. In 1999 in the Portrait Award Tift won 3rd Prize with his portrait of the politician Tony Benn, commissioned by the House of Commons. At the Portrait Gallery, in 2002, the politicians Neil and Glenys Kinnock unveiled a portrait of themselves by Tift.