Melbourne-born, Deborah Klein lived in London for many years before returning to Australia to study fine art.
Her award-winning work has been exhibited at a number of galleries and she has achieved wide renown for her paintings.
Deborah Klein writes . . .
I live in St Kilda, a seaside town in Melbourne, with my partner Shane and two cats Diva and Dorothy Parker. St Kilda is also my home town. I grew up here and lived here until 1973 when I moved to London where I lived until 1980…
When I returned to Australia I went to art school and obtained my Bachelor of Arts degree. Later I completed a Graduate Diploma course and I am now in the process of finishing my Master of Arts in Visual Arts. I have finished the visual work and am now writing my research paper. It’s going OK, but like most artists, I’d rather do my artwork.
I have exhibited my pictures since 1985 in a number of group and solo shows in Australia and overseas. Usually I do paintings, drawing and linocuts.
But all my life (and I have very old friends who remember me saying this) I have wanted to illustrate a children’s book.
One day, not so long ago, a draft copy of Nadia Wheatley’s book The Greatest Treasure of Charlemagne the King arrived in the mail. (One of my paintings had been used on the cover of a collection of Australian short stories. One of Nadia’s stories was in that same volume, and that’s how she first became aware of my work.) I read Charlemagne and loved it. After doing some sample drawings, I got the job! It really was a dream come true.
One of the nicest parts of the job was the freedom I had. During the course of the story, the King accumulates quite a menagerie. I had great fun including my own cats, who appear throughout the book.
I also fell in love with the endearing character of Alcuin the librarian!
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