Role: Contemporary Artist
Company: Freelance
Track Record: Christine Trueman is a full-time, contemporary artist who lives just outside Lisburn with her husband and three children.
TELL US ABOUT YOU DAY:
8.00am:
My husband is a very early riser and I tend to work late so I’m quite spoilt because he brings me coffee in bed every morning. We sometimes take a bout of madness and go to the gym early, leaving home at 6.15am and returning home before the boys wake up. It’s difficult getting up and motivated at that hour but it’s the best way to start a productive day with heightened energy levels – until about 8pm that is, and then it’s crash!
8.40am:
The school run begins. I have three sons aged 18, 16 and 11 so I leave my older boys to the bus stop and take the youngest to primary school in Saintfield. At this point, I would normally call into the office to catch up on paperwork as I’m also the chairperson of the Board of Governors for Millennium Integrated Primary School. This additional role in my life has given me the chance to broaden my horizons and work on my passion for integration in schools.
9.00am – 10.00am:
This is the perfect time of the day to make phone calls, check emails, reply to any correspondence and liaise with my peers. Working from home offers me the flexibility that I need to juggle my work, school and mum roles. It means I can drop everything if an opportunity arises, or if I’ve forgotten someone’s lunch or sports gear (I’m notorious for this). It also means that I can nip into town or meet a friend for coffee when the notion takes me. This is what keeps me sane, I get distracted easily and find that taking a step back occasionally offers the chance for a new perspective.
10.00am – 11.00am:
Usually I would cram in some housework but if I’m avoiding domesticity, I shall take the dog for a walk and enjoy the fresh air instead. My smartphone is my best friend so I am always snapping inspiration when out and about before heading home to catalogue my random snaps.
11.00am – 2.30pm:
I spend early afternoons working in my studio. Painting and photography are my creative niches. I have just finished my new collection of paintings and screen prints featuring silver screen sirens from the Golden Age of Hollywood Glamour. These include Ava Gardner, Greta Garbo, Audrey Hepburn and the most celebrated of all actresses, Marilyn Monroe.
Colour is such an important role in my work, in fact in my life generally. Subtlety has never been my strong point and I’m always attracted to art that ‘shouts’ at me and demands my attention so I spend a long time deciding on individual colours for each piece or series of paintings. How the colours relate to each other is crucial. I love working with simple, definable expressions; vibrant, highly textured colour and abstract compositions which are instantly recognisable. I count artists such as Warhol and Lichtenstein as well as local artist, free styler Neil Shawcross as my main influencers.
3.00pm – 4.00pm:
It’s back to school for pickups. I’m fortunate that I am able to fit work around my kids. When the boys were younger I found it difficult to work at home and I ended up burning the candle at both ends. Now they are older, they are more independent and understand work and home life boundaries. I still have some parental guilt but when push comes to shove I always put my kids before work.
5:00pm:
I start making dinner. I am also on “taxi duty” for my sons and their increasingly busy social lives. Early evening is a time for me to help with homework and then relax. I am a bit of a puzzle freak but I’m also very competitive so rather than relaxing me, this sometimes winds me up – I cannot happily leave a crossword unfinished! It’s actually sketching and prepping for new paintings keeps me most relaxed.
9.00pm – 12.00am:
I am back painting in my studio. There may be poor light at this time but actually this is when I work best – with no distractions. When I paint, a lot of my work is very spontaneous. I like to be driven by the emotion of the moment so when I return to a painting, I can see that the spontaneity has allowed emotions to dictate a lot more of the work than I was aware of. Having a break from my work in the later part of the day really works for me in this way.
2:00am:
This is usually my bedtime but I have been known to work much, much later.
Christine’s solo exhibition, ‘Screen Lovers’, inspired by the 85th anniversary of the Oscars, is launching this Sunday at 7pm at an Oscar themed night in Belfast’s QFT. The exhibition runs until Friday 8 March.
www.christinetrueman.com