Mary Fedden

Mary Fedden (Bristol, 1915 – London, 2012) was a British painter known for her still lifes, flower paintings and interior landscapes. Born in Bristol, she studied at the Slade School of Fine Arts in London from 1932 to 1936, where she was a pupil of the theatre designer Vladimir Polunin. Before the Second World War she taught, painted portraits and designed sets for the Sadler's Wells Theatre. During the war she served in the Women's Land Army, the Woman's Voluntary Service and as a NAAFI driver in Europe, and she was commissioned to paint murals for the war effort.

After the war she developed her own style of flower paintings and still lifes, with bold colours and strong contrasts, although some works from 2005 and 2006 use a narrower tonal range. She often placed her still lifes in front of a landscape, enjoying the contrast between disparate elements. Her commissions included murals for the Festival of Britain in 1951, for the P&O liner Canberra in 1961 and for Charing Cross Hospital in 1980. She held one-person shows across the UK every year from 1947 until her death.

Fedden taught painting at the Royal College of Art from 1958 to 1964, becoming the first woman tutor in its Painting School; her pupils included David Hockney and Allen Jones. Her work is held in numerous public collections, including the Tate and the Royal Academy, and she was an academician of the Royal Academy.