Drawing was always liked by Wendy Walsh since her childhood. She was born on April 9th in 1915 in Westmoreland, Cumbria in a merchant family belonging to the clan of Storeys of Lancaster. Her family moved to London when she was just five years old as her father took up managing the family business there. She lived a comfortable and liveried existence, with nine servants serving the family.
As a child she was fascinated by horses. She took to drawing them first and then dogs, and other animals. Her interest developed further in drawing after she had occasion to visit the Wallace Collection in London. Her grandfather owned several paintings that depicted horses and young Wendy was much attracted to the art in the paintings.
All of a sudden at age fourteen her parents divorced. Wendy then moved to a rented accommodation with her mother. Her chance of attending art school was gone alongwith further education. With adversity, genius flowers and in Wendy's case this became true. She while helping her younger brother and sister started writing and observing nature. To force depression away from her, she took to doing portraits of pets.
It was only in 1958, after she moved to Ireland, that she started a career in botanical art. However, she had already visited the country in 1938 to attend the Dublin Horse Show. It was during that visit that she was attracted towards the countryside. The light after rain had stopped especially gave her an insight into nature's beauty.
However, the war that ensued later soon ended her sojourn and she was posted as a volunteer in a hospital 12 miles away from Hall's Farm, her home on long lease. She commuted to the hospital on Pandora, her beloved horse. Soon thereafter, she was forced to relinquish her horse because of food shortages and that became the hardest thing for Wendy Storey to bear in her life.
She married John Walsh, a British army officer in 1941. War meant that the family always remained on the move and difficult times befell Wendy. However, being resourceful enough she managed to buy a cow and milk her. After the Second World War, Wendy moved with her family first to Japan, then Singapore, and finally to Lusk in the US. They moved to Kildare in 1999 in Ireland.
Considering that most of her life she was occupied with the vicissitudes of family life, it is all the more appreciable what she has been able to achieve as a botanical artist after 1958, and more so especially after 1999. It reveals her strength of character and the clarity with which she can see plants, trees and flowers even after withstanding the tough times she had undergone earlier.
Wendy Walsh's best effort in botanical art emerges in her 96 watercolor original plates known collectively as An Irish Florilegium housed in the famous Great Palm House. The perfection of all those specimens of botanical art at its best is still there for you to behold and admire Wendy Walsh as a great exponent of scientific botanical art.
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