Christine Sullivan is an artist and designer living in Santa Fe, NM. Her design practice, cstudiodesign.com, specialized in arts/culture and included clients like Museum of Indian Arts + Culture in Santa Fe, and Guggenheim Museum in NYC. She also taught portfolio design at The City College of New York.

In 2019 Sullivan moved to Santa Fe and began working solely on her art practice, encompassing fiber, silkscreen, painting and assemblage.

My most distinctive material is felt, which I use to create a visual language that engages viewers with words and symbols. I appreciate felt’s craft-like, non-high art quality, and the humor and poignancy it can deliver when used in serious contexts.

I like repeating words and patterns. Since my work is often message-centric, word repetition can evoke brainwashing, indoctrination, propaganda, and advertising. I also repeat patterned icons of importance like praying hands or gold tassels. The more, the holier! For me repetition demonstrates the power of ‘frequency’ (as it’s called in the design + advertising world) to persuade the masses to follow a religion or buy an expensive bar of soap.

In the fall of 2022, Sullivan’s work, “Choice” was exhibited in Soul of a Nation, a Save Art Space billboard project, in Albuquerque. Earlier that year, she realized a Santa Fe Railyard art installation, “Hope Dies Last”, as a tribute to Studs Terkel, the renowned author, oral historian and champion of social justice.

During 2020-21, Sullivan received a grant from the City of Santa Fe to realize a social practice project, “Felt During COVID” which encouraged the community to create artwork, giving voice to their experience. The artwork was exhibited at the Public Library gallery and a virtual reception and auction to benefit the Navajo Nation COVID Response Fund followed.

Also in 2020, her work, “Flowers Grow Out of Dark Moments—Corita Kent” was exhibited as an enlarged billboard outside SITE Santa Fe as part of the museum’s 2020 Silver Linings project.