Christie Scheele (born August 10, 1957), sometimes credited as Max Scheele, was a colorist for Marvel and DC in the 1980s and '90s, including over 100 issues of Daredevil. She is also a renowned landscape painter.
Life & Career[]
Scheele earned her BFA in 1980 from Alfred University, which included a fellowship at the Royal Academy of Fine Art and the University Complutense of Madrid (1978-79). She also graduated summa cum laude with a BA in Spanish language and literature.
After college, her roommate's boyfriend (writer Steve Skeates) introduced her to editor Denny O'Neil, who helped her learn how to color comics. Two of her earliest assignments were a run on Bill Sienkewicz's Moon Knight and an issue of Frank Miller's Daredevil. Both characters remained her favorite to work on because the frequent night scenes and single-color costumes allowed her to play with tones and hues, which remains a theme of her paintings to this day.
She began using the "Max Scheele" pseudonym as a tribute to letterer Dan Crespi, who once nicknamed her "Max" after a really short haircut. She only meant to use it for the month after he passed away, but many of her editors, not understanding the context of the name, continued to use it.
Near the end of her coloring career, she worked with another colorist, Krista Ward, though she ultimately found sharing the work more inefficient than working alone. As computers became more common and digital coloring widespread, she opted to focus on her painting career (which she had continued to work on throughout her coloring career) rather than invest the time and money in learning new coloring techniques.
Her landscapes are a part of many public and private collections, including the Queens Museum of Art, the Dorsky Museum, the Tyler Museum of Art, American Airlines, Waterford Crystal, Mark Ruffalo, Kelsey Grammer, and Howard and Ellen Greenberg. Her paintings have also appeared in films such as “Broken Flowers” and “Perfect Strangers”. Her works have been featured in Architectural Digest and have been written about and reviewed extensively in the Hudson Valley and beyond.
She is married to letterer and writer Jack Morelli.
Sources[]
- Interview with ManWithoutFear.com, January 2011. Accessed 10 August 2017.