Christine’s career commenced as an apprentice commercial artist – drawing still life objects in line and half tone – and progressed into retail and fashion advertising artwork.
She moved into the book world as a book designer before becoming an illustrator. For 15 years Christine was a freelance illustrator of children’s books, both educational and fictional, for local and international publishers. This work entailed inventing characters with continuity, exhibiting multiple facial expressions and gestures, as well as designing costumes and settings. Most of the work in this period was by air-brush.
In 1995 Christine began painting in oils and pastel drawing, taking it up full time. In tandem with general subject themes, she commenced portraiture and found an enduring love of capturing the likeness of fellow man. She is equally at ease with pastel painting, and has won a number of prizes in this medium, as well as oil painting awards. Christine’s well-instilled work ethic is of economy of time, and she can execute a portrait in as little as three hours, but prefers nine to ten hours. She likes to work directly from the subject, enabling her to seek out the nuances of skin tone and light, and giving an opportunity to learn more about the sitter and hopefully to depict their character.
Christine travels frequently and extensively with her husband, enabling her fascination of facial diversity, ethnicity of character and expression to be a continual study. At every opportunity she indulges in galleries and art museums around the world. She has a deep passion for all things Japanese, including the study of the principles of Oriental art.