Christina Foard was born in Panama City, Florida back in the 60s. Her dad was a USN officer, so we moved every year until I was 10. She always loved stories, imaginative worlds, and drawing - all of which led Foard toward a BFA in Painting and Printmaking at the University of Cincinnati. The artist moved to the DC area after graduating, working as a project manager in the budding online learning industry. In 2003, she moved to Jacksonville, FL (2003-2014) with a career shift toward fine art as Public Programs Manager and Museum Educator at the Cummer Museum of Art and Gardens. 2007 marks the beginning of a daily studio practice as a painter. Foard directed the Arts in Medicine program at UF Medical Center in Jacksonville from 2008-2015. In 2014, her family circumstances changed, and they relocated to Athens, GA, where Christina returned to school and received an MFA at the University of Georgia. She serves as a full-time painting instructor at UGA. Foard’s work has been shown in solo and group exhibitions regionally, nationally, and internationally, and has been acquired by major corporations and private collections including the Cummer Museum of Art and Gardens. Artist Statement“Painting interior/exterior scenes is an exercise in translating experiences, emotions, and environments. Regardless of shifts in iconography, my work incorporates perceptions about time, memories, and quotidian objects as symbolic placeholders for people and relationships. I interpret observed scenes and incorporate invented components. Structure and pattern tend to be my preferred starting place, and throughout, I strive to remain in a state of “play,” housed in curiosity and openness. I respond most to marks where there’s an intuitive response, a humanness, captured sensitivity, or personification, over planned or preconceived outcomes. When I become uncertain about formal solutions in each work, I experiment with alternative materials. I have found this process deepens my ideation and pushes me toward innovation and authenticity. My recent work incorporates several layers of silk, which reinterprets and activates the trapped space between the front and back of the painting stretcher. By manipulating transparencies and opacities, I can incorporate the use of shadows. I’ve been called a painters’ painter over the decades, but regardless of labels, my goal is to produce work that has authenticity and originality.”