Australian artist CJ Hendry initially engaged in art as a pastime, but she achieved recognition on Instagram and subsequently left university to follow a career in art. In 2014, she completed her first sale with an illustration of a pair of boots produced by the Australian footwear brand R.M. Williams, which fetched $10,000. Since that time, her artworks have reportedly generated millions in revenue. At the outset, Hendry focused on creating large-scale, hyperrealistic ink drawings of luxury items — consistently in black and white — with each artwork requiring as much as 200 hours to finish. She later transitioned to producing photorealistic illustrations of subjects such as disco balls and a $100 bill featuring Kanye West’s image, which the pop star purchased from her. In a 2017 partnership with the fashion label Christian Louboutin, Hendry broadened her artistic approach to incorporate color, depicting hyperreal blobs of vibrant paint using colored pencils.
