Since 1967, when her first
bronze sculpture was exhibited during the Montreal
Expo, Christina Grace
has been on a lifelong journey in the pursuit of
artistic expression. Her training, education and
experience
in
art has taken her from her homeland of Canada to
Europe, through the Middle East, South America,
China and throughout the United States. All this
dramatically contributed to her evolvement as a
contemporary
abstract expressionist artist.
At age 15, her first
bronze sculpture was included in the semi-finals for
the Montreal 1967 Expo. At age 16,
she was offered a mentorship by world-renowned sculptor
Sorel Etrog. Thereafter, she continued to study
art until attending boarding school in Montreux, Switzerland.
This led to her attendance at the Université
de la Sorbonne, studying French Language and Civilization,
while auditing courses at L'Ecole du
Louvre. After studying in Europe for almost 5 years,
she returned to North America. She studied art at the University of New Mexico. She later participated
in the Mentor Program at Santa Monica College
of Design, Art and Architecture.
Ms. Grace has used
every available opportunity through her extensive education
and international travel to
study and seek an evolving and gratifying artistic
expression that could be shared with others. Ms. Grace
has been greatly inspired by the works of many world-renowned
New York Abstract Expressionists and gestural painters, including
Rothko, Motherwell, de Kooning and Franz Kline. Her
art is also inspired by Diebenkorn, Klee,
Calder and Miro.
Her gestural art evokes intuitive
imagery. All works are highly textured, drawing from
her early experience as a
sculptor. Her work has been curated into several significant
private and corporate abstract
art collections. Ms. Grace's work is sought by galleries,
philanthropists and collectors alike. Her paintings
and sculpture have been exhibited in both the United
States and Canada. Several contemporary art
museums are currently following her work with an eye
to future exhibition and/or acquisition.
Additionally, her work is available through the
Los Angeles County
Museum of Art, Art Rental and Sales
Gallery.
The current collection includes paintings,
etchings, monoprints, maquettes, sculptures and
drawings. At present, her artwork is
expressed in three parallel tracks: (1) gestural
work,
and (2) relief work on
canvas, and (3) sculpture.
The relief work, created in sculpted mediums, and her
`sandscapes'
which are sculpted in sand and lava on
canvas, are highly textured and rich in color palette.
Much of her relief work is inspirational to much
larger bas-relief which can be cast in bronze and/or
mixed
metals. Approximately 275 works have been sold over the
past 25 years.
Ms. Grace is in the process of establishing
an art mentorship program which is titled "Guns
to Brushes". The
program will be administered by a non-profit organization
to be formed with the same name. The
early stages of the mentorship program will include
the establishment of a beta site, with real-time access by
school children through the world-wide web. The program
will include national, state and regional
award programs and eventually adoption of one or more
public schools where funding for arts programs
would be done on a grant basis. This is intended to
be a model program which could easily be adopted in
other communities. As a beneficiary of mentorship programs,
Ms. Grace is determined to give back to America's
youth, some of the values she received in such programs. "Guns
to Brushes" will have
an
advisory board of art educators, museum curators, philanthropists,
art gallery owners and corporate arts
sponsors. The program is designed to inspire creativity
in youth
and individual self-expression through
non-violent means. In addition to "Guns to Brushes", Ms. Grace is also involved with several global peace initiatives. |
