Christine Tsetso
Histoire de l'artiste
My family moved to the NWT for the first time in 1986. I have always been a creative type and interested in making art, even as a small child. I used to make boxes with lids and clay figures from the age of two. As a pre-teen, I decided that I wanted to be a graphic artist, which is what I took in college after taking a year of Fine Arts at Okanagan University, following high school graduation in 1997. I worked as a graphic artist in Edmonton and Yellowknife, until I moved to Fort Simpson from 2008-2019 and was not able to continue that as a career path. I now live in Yellowknife again and love how there is inspiration all around and so many artists to collaborate with.
I like to paint Northern scenes, usually starting the process with my camera. I’ll take photographs of dilapidated buildings and old mine equipment, and then recreate them on canvas. I love the vast array of flora we have in our beautiful Territory. My favorite is fireweed which grows in large patches and is really striking against any background.
I make art because it is an outlet for me to expel my creative energies outside of my office job. There are so many mediums and possible outcomes. I am always up for trying out something new. Lately, I’ve switched to oils, but have painted with acrylics, watercolors, and silk painting as well as mixed media and computer-rendered artworks.
Christine Tsetso has lived in the North since she was 8 years old (1987) and very much considers it to be where her heart and roots are. She has been an artist her entire life in a sense, having a very creative and innovative persona from the very begining. Evidently they are traits that have run in her family for generations as her father, mother aunt and grandmother are all talented artists.
Aspiring to be a high school art teacher, National Geographic photographer or graphic artist from an early age, she went on to attend the Fine Arts program at Okanagan University College for a year, then switched to the Digital Art and Design program at Thompson Rivers University in 2000 graduating with a diploma. After working as a web designer and photo archivist, she finally found employment as a digital artist at Inkit Ltd., a company she worked for for a couple of years and still adores.
After meeting and marrying a sailor from Fort Simpson in 2007, she relocated and no longer had opportunity to continue such a profession in the small town. After 8 years of focusing mainly on her photographic work, Christine has now reclaimed her brush and is feeling inspired and motivated to explore new artistic mediums.
Christine is now working in silk painting, oils and watercolors and most enjoys painting imagery reminiscent of the North. Woodland scenes featuring local flora and fauna, or anything abandoned and rusty such as old mining equipment and buildings are her favourite subjects. She is working on teaching her five year old daughter all of the artsy things she’s learned over the years, in hopes that the need to be expressive and continually create has been inherited.
Despite her love of traveling the world, Yellowknife's Old Town will forever be one of her favorite places to haunt, with her camera at her side.
Galerie de l'artiste
