Born in Hong Kong in 1964, Jackie was raised and educated in Singapore and England. Thanks to adventurous parents and colorful pioneering ancestors, Jackie and her family traveled extensively to places like India, Africa and the Far East. She came to the U.S. on vacation in 1986 and never left. Initially living in Newport Beach, California, the boat world was and still is a very familiar environment to her – her father Tony is a boat builder.flemingyachts.com
Jackie spent eight years living on a boat and working in a local coffee shop where people from all walks of life and continents gather to shoot the breeze and suck down their favorite brew. During this time Jackie spent much of her time doodling children’s illustrations in her then favorite medium – colored pencils. Later she started to paint these same illustrations and you can see her children's artwork on her 'Wacky Jack Kids' page. This unique name comes from the nickname her nieces gave to her, Aunty Wacky, and she does all she can to live up to it!

In 1994, the call of the wild brought Jackie to Santa Fe, New Mexico. A fan of westerns and pioneering history all of her life, the wide open spaces, high desert climate and attitudes felt like a dream come true. She now spends much of her time with her first love – horses, and she started a wild horse sanctuary in the year 2000. The sanctuary is based on her 50 acre ranch near the village of Cerrillos, just south of Santa Fe, and on 420 beautiful acres up at Watrous. To learn more about her cause and to see the horses go to cimarronskydog.com.There is also a wonderful gallery on that site selling Jackie's equine art and photography and books as well as works by other telented artists willing to donate their works to help the horses.
Jackie’s preferred medium is acrylics on canvas with which she paints, in her off beat and vivid style, not only what she sees outside her window but scenes from her past – the high desert, tropical beaches, English row houses, green fields, and African plains. Self-taught, Jackie loves to use color and scale in her paintings, often incorporating little houses into vast and varying landscapes.

Note from the artist: Many people ask me about the 'meaning' or sentiment behind my paintings. I find it hard to psycho-analyse, define or explain my work. Believe me, I've heard some people interpret one of my paintings and I've thought to myself,'You saw all of that in there? Man, I'm not nearly that complicated!' I think paintings aren't about the artist transferring his or her feelings to someone else. I think an artist paints for what they want to say but what the audience gets from the painting comes from within each of them. Each of us have different tastes, memories and backgrounds and that is what makes us respond to something in our own unique way.

Having said all of this though, there is one thing I would like to explain about myself. For the record, I love rainstorms. Any storm depicted in one of my paintings does not represent a negative event for me but more a promise of a blessing. Having lived in New Mexico now for over 15 years, storms have become a magical and exhilerating event full of drama, beauty and the hope of much longed for rain. Rain brings life and the storms here, especially in the summer monsoons are a celebration. Massive build-ups of boiling and mutating thunderheads whose dark, brooding and rumbling underbellies trail semi-transparent rain. Chilly winds build as the storm approaches and there are multiple rainbows and the most out of this world lighting. The sun, a dominant and not easily dismissed presence here in the high desert, persistantly competes to make sure its presence is known and therefore the battle between sun and rain creates a tapestry of light and colors that are breathtaking and other- worldly. There is lightning and a sudden downpour of rain that can be so pin-pointed that you could be soaked and muddy on one side of the road while the other remains bone dry and sun drenched. I always feel that rain here, or anywhere for that matter, is natures own scratch and sniff. It releases smells into the newly moist air that are intoxicating. In my neighborhood there is the eau de wet soil, horse manure, junipers and sage. Wonderful!