Christian Waller was the daughter of William Edward Yandell, a Victorian-born plasterer, and his wife Emily. Christian began her art studies in 1905 under Carl Steiner at the Castlemaine School of Mines and was later taught by Hugh Fegan at the Bendigo School of Mines. She exhibited her work at the Bendigo Art Gallery and the local Masonic Hall in 1909, and in Melbourne next year. The family moved in 1910 to Melbourne where Christian attended the National Gallery schools, studying under Frederick McCubbin and Berard Hall. She illustrated several publications in the following years, including Melba's Gift Book of Australian Art and Literature (1915), and E. J. Brady's Australia Unlimited (1918). She married her former fellow-student Mervyn Napier Waller (q.v.) in 1915.
During the 1920s Christian Waller became a leading book illustrator, winning acclaim as the first Australian artist to illustrate Alice in Wonderland (1924). The Wallers travelled to London in 1929 to investigate the manufacture of stained glass at Whall & Whall Ltd's premises. They also visited Ireland to meet the mystic writers Lord Edward Dunsany and 'A.E.' (G. W. Russell). Returning to Australia via Italy, they studied the mosaics at Ravenna and Venice. Christian signed and exhibited her work under her maiden name until 1930, but thereafter used her married name. Her art and writing featured in Manuscripts, edited and published by H. T. Miller. Using the 1849 press she owned with her husband, in 1932 she designed, cut, and hand printed The Great Breath: A Book of Seven Designs, her best printed work. Her illustrated fairy tale, The Gates of Dawn, also appeared in 1932.
Estranged from her husband, Christian went to New York in 1939. She joined one of the communes established by the religious leader Father Devine, and completed several murals. In 1940 she returned to the home she shared with her husband at Ivanhoe, Melbourne. She immersed herself in her work and became increasingly reclusive. In 1942 she painted a large mural for Christ Church, Geelong; by 1948 she had completed more than fifty stained-glass windows. Survived by her husband, she died of hypertensive heart failure on 25 May 1954 at Ivanhoe and was cremated.
Adapted from the Australian Dictionary of Biography. For the full entry see Christian Waller.
