Christina was born and educated in Dublin and moved to London in 1980 at the age of 17, where she studied multi-media before a 12-year career in journalism, which started at Vogue Magazine.

 

A hedonistic life with little to show for it ensued, till 13 years later she returned to her enduring interest in psychology (the summer before she left for London, Christina studied psychology at Harvard University). 

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In the 90s, following the break- up her marriage, she went home to Dublin, to get sober and complete a four-year training in psychotherapy. She practiced as a psychotherapist for the next decade till, in 2010, when SoulBurgers was written, she established its eponymous art house to bring words into three-dimensional spaces.

 

In 2012 she won the Allianz /Tile Style Artist of the Year Award.

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In 2016 Patrick Murphy, Director of the RHA opened ‘Wit’s End’, her installation on the life and death of writer Dorothy Parker at Smock Alley Theatre in Dublin. This work invited visitors to experience the American poet’s soul, unfulfilled, and in search of peace.

 

Her most recent work, ‘Glad I Did It’ was staged in an art gallery in London.  This three-floor, multi-media installation offered its ‘Container of Soul’ through the story of nightclub hostess Ruth Ellis, who was the last woman to be hanged in England. As Ruth Ellis’s cell represented the mind, visitors were invited to recognise that this space can be a place of psychological freedom, as it was for Ellis, who, following a life of poverty, violence, and alcoholism, appreciated her time here.

 

Ruth Ellis wanted fame so it was appropriate that, as part of the vision of this work, ‘Glad I Did It’ attracted international media, including The Guardian, Harper's Bazaar, The Irish Times & Sky News.