Charlotte Fisher was born in 1959 and brought up in Whangarei. She completed a Bachelor of Arts in 1980 and a Bachelor of Fine Arts in 1989 at Elam School of Art, Auckland University.

Charlotte lives and works as a practising sculptor in Auckland, exhibiting regularly and has works in public and corporate collections around the country. She was involved with Sculpture 2001, a millennium project aimed at siting eight new sculptures in the Auckland Domain grounds.

August 1998 the Whangarei Art Museum mounted a survey exhibition of her work and the Sentinel 2000commission was a follow-on from that.

Charlotte is a sculptor who has given some thought to the conceptual issues of public art. This is reflected in Sentinel 2000 with its refined, stately presence in the park; in materials sympathetic to the natural environment. Yet up close, there is a rugged immediacy to the bronze castings.

Even at a glance it is obvious that this work was expensive to produce. Public art comes with its special demands. Other than art/social concerns, the basic requirements are that the site often demands work of a certain scale and the outdoor public environment requires materials and construction of a certain permanence. Charlotte was able to meet these demands within the commission budget and working in her preferred materials, thanks to a friend who helped with the bronze castings and stone carving, working at a "mate's rates."

Charlotte has in fact been pleased with her commission and with the outcome. But it may be worth considering whether there is a minimum budget threshold only above which it is possible to produce significant works that meet the inherent demands of public art. Below this level there comes a forced pressure on the artist to consider innovative use of lower cost materials, a different solution to the requirements of scale, or to charge very little for time.