R E C L A I M E D

By Christine Leader

Artist Bio

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Predominantly self-taught, Christine earned a Diploma in Advertising Art in 1995.

Born in Manitoba and raised just outside of Portage La Prairie on a small family farm, Christine  attended Red River  Community College in Winnipeg for their Advertising Arts Program.

She worked for nearly 20 years as a graphic designer but moved on once she began having eyesight issues that made it difficult to work full time at a computer.

She bought her first iPad with stylus in 2018.

“Suddenly with the help of a back-lit screen I was able to see and zoom into what I was working on and with the introduction of the apple pencil, I could draw. I had everything I needed and the tools to help. The missing spots from each eye my brain fills in with detail from the other (and magic) was no longer an issue! I could see what I was drawing, and I could create the pictures I wanted to create again.”

For Christine, reclaimed is about reclaiming a part of herself that her vision deficit took. She chose to draw things that she missed, like living in the country, wandering through the high grass looking at the old, rusted machinery on the farm. She drew endangered animals, and she drew a portrait of two people that are dear to her heart and represent the generation of folk that she points out -  “...are who we are all isolating and self distancing for.”

She states “Despite the fact that they (the pieces) all seem unrelated, they are related in my heart. They represent things that I want to keep and not loose.”

Reclaiming some things is not easy. An extinction of a way of life, or an animal is much more complex a thing to recover from. Reclaiming an ability you've lost is sometimes difficult to.