About Christine
Born in a village just outside Birmingham in 1940. My mother told me later that the name of the nursing home was called St Ives. At 3 yrs old, I was too young to be aware that we were at war. It was quite normal for me to see barrage balloons, spitfires, bomb craters, barbed wire, tanks going up and down the road and long queues, ration books in hand. In fact, as a small child, I found everything really exciting. I have always loved drawing and painting. I won my first prize at the age of 8 yrs at school in a safety first competition. At 15 I went to Sutton School of Art. My teacher said that I "Definitely had a talent". It felt good to get that encouragement. In 1962 I came to St Ives in Cornwall, which had long since been my dream. As I stepped off the train I could see the lights around the harbour, felt the warmth of the setting sun and I knew somehow I would stay.
In 1963 I married into a Cornish family. I had five children. Bringing them up was a wonderful experience, but very time consuming and painting was put on hold. I did find time to go to the St Ives School of Painting and joined the life classes led by Leonard Fuller. That was an exciting time to be in beautiful St Ives in the 60's with so many talented artists.
I rejoined the life drawing classes in the early 90's before starting an access course based at Falmouth School of Art in 1989/1991. This was successful but because of a tight personal budget I was unable to continue onto the B.A course in Fine Art. Not deterred, I worked hard to make my own way in the art world.
I sold many works in my one woman show at the The Crypt Gallery in Norway Square 2004 and had work in the group "Taking Space". I have always loved writing, both poems and children's books and used my artist skills to bring these to life with illustrations. I have grown in confidence and my work shows my great interest in the "Human Being". As human beings, we have an enormous untapped potential for strength, compassion and courage. I like to dig deep within myself to find these qualities and somehow I hope to share the possibilities that this has shown me with other people through my writing, paintings and drawings.