Josefine Hennel was born in Germany and came to Australia in 1964. She travelled extensively in Australia and abroad and settled with her husband and three children in Brighton, Victoria, where she still lives.

She had always loved sketching and learnt the basics of tonal painting in the Blackie Realist Art School in Hampton, Melbourne. To improve her skills she studied at the Victorian Artists Society under Maxwell Wilks for several years and attended different workshops with a variety of tutors including Janet Hayes, Brian Armstrong and Shirley Bourne. She believes painting is an ongoing learning process and is at present studying portraiture under Lee Machelak.

She successfully exhibited her work in Germany in a group exhibition in 1984 and since then has had several showings of her paintings in Melbourne. Her last exhibition was in 2011 at the Greenhill Gallery in Adelaide. In 2012 she was invited to take part in an exhibition in the Hilton Hotel in Adelaide. She has won several prizes and awards including ‘Best Paining under $500’ in the Camberwell Rotary Art Show in 2005, with the most recent being ‘Best Painting under $750’ in The Brighton Rotary Art Show in 2011.

In 2006 she was invited to become a member of AGRA (Australian Guild of Realist Artists). She is a member of the Pastel Society of Victoria and the Victorian Artists Society.

Her work has been published in the International Artist magazine and The Australian Artist magazine.