12 Nov SPIRIT In motion
Christine Tisa’s Audi Q3 combines creativity and confidence.
WRITER: JAY BRIDA
White—according to the Rudolph Steiner school’s application of color theory, first explored and popularized by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe—represents the soul’s image of the spirit. It’s appropriate, then, that if a white Audi Q3 can embody Tisa’s soul, it has the capacity to carry her spirit: her paintings.
Most times, you don’t think about color theory before buying a white Audi Q3. But then, unlike Christine Tisa, you didn’t study color theory and embrace it in how you express yourself.
A gallery owner, artist, yoga instructor and art educator, Tisa lives during the summer and autumn in Clayton, N.Y.— an artistic enclave 90 miles north of Syracuse and on the St. Lawrence River. There, she uses color to create the world as she sees and feels it, from ships to animals and spiritual imagery to abstractions.
“I was taught to start with the colors, make them move on the canvas and then create what your image becomes,” she said, describing her technique.
A native of Rochester, N.Y., Tisa came to art later in life, saying she learned how to draw after earning her Master of Science degree in arts education from Syracuse University and then further refined her style. She found the Steiner school’s teaching with her Master of Fine Arts degree in painting from Rochester Institute of Technology.
When northern New York becomes a little too cold, Tisa travels to gain inspiration and warm herself. She explores Italy, Puerto Rico and Costa Rica often, and her work reflects the various places in which she has lived, taught and visited. As Tisa discussed her life, her love of teaching, her appreciation of the connection she feels between art and yoga, she came back to her Q3.
“I was thinking about how it connects to me,” she said. “I love the car, but I realized something. It was important to me last fall. The weather was bad, and a friend of mine was in hospice in New Hartford, N.Y.”
Despite the poor driving conditions, Tisa never worried because the car has quattro® all-wheel drive.” I felt confident going to see my friend,” she said. “Knowing I was able to see her, four or five more times, even in foul weather—that helped my soul.”
That and the images of the spirit she’s able to carry in it.