Christine O'Keeffe

Christine was born and brought up in London, then moved to Suffolk in her teens, and now for the last thirteen years has been living and working in Scotland, where she has a traditional croft house near the village of Edderton, North of Inverness. Buried deep in the countryside the house overlooks a wooded valley to the South and has views of Struie Hills to the North. Christine says of her surroundings: The beauty of the landscape in Scotland is comparable to the best anywhere in the world, I feel overwhelmed and inspired by the ever changing drama, texture and colour of the scenery.

Christine has always worked in the field of Art and Design, she entered Art College at the age of sixteen, where she originally trained as a potter and then taught for a number of years before re-training as an interior designer, to run her own business. More recently Christine qualified and worked as a landscape architect, despite this comprehensive association with the design world she only commenced working with watercolours eight years ago, when a friend persuaded her to join her at a watercolour workshop.

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She approached the medium with confidence only to find that watercolour has a mind of its own, there then ensued a battle between artist and medium, which still continues today. The results of these battles are bold contemporary works, which push the boundaries of this traditionally based medium. Christine admits she chose to work in watercolour as a challenge. There is no other medium whose delicacy and immediacy is so dramatically opposed to my own dark and dramatic sketching style, I felt if I could adapt the medium to my style of work I might create watercolours that were distinctive.

From working full-time as a landscape architect and only being able to paint a few days a year, Christine has for the past three years practised as a full-time artist, she mainly exhibits locally, with great success, but has also exhibited in London and Bedford and her work has found its way into the homes and work places of private collectors in as far-flung places as Australia, South Africa and New York. Christine has no intention of making another change of artistic direction having found such a worthy adversary in the medium of watercolour, her latest twist in a career that has seen so many changes is certainly the most challenging and is definitely the most rewarding.