About Me

I was born in Port Shepstone, South Africa in 1951, the youngest of five children and developed an interest in art from an early age.

When I was seven years old, my family relocated to Pietermaritzburg, where I attended Athlone Primary School, before moving on to Wykeham (now The Wykeham Collegiate) for my high schooling.

On moving to Johannesburg, I matriculated at the Johannesburg School of Art, Ballet, Drama and Music. I then attended The Johannesburg College of Art, after which I worked at the University of the Witwatersrand as a layout artist on “Wits Student” and other student publications.

I married Barry Mc Daniel in 1973 and our two children, Catherine and Matthew were born in 1976 and 1978 respectively. During this period, I devoted my time to my family, whilst still managing to use my artistic talents, by creating my own unconventional bed-spreads, using recycled fabric. I also created ornate mirror frames (again using recycled materials), along with other artistic endeavours.

In the late 1980’s when I felt that my children no longer needed me on a full-time basis, I decided to engage in further studies and graduated, at the age of 38, with a Diploma in Fine Arts at the Witwatersrand Technikon, in 1989.

In 1990, I teamed up with an artist friend and established Greenway Art Studio in Greenside, Johannesburg, where we taught art to students of all ages and also offered adult figure drawing classes on two evenings a week. The studio was successful and I ran it until our family moved to the KwaZulu-Natal south coast in 1996.

Since moving to Trafalgar, I have had the opportunity to devote the majority of my time to painting, which has enabled me to build up a substantial body of work. My paintings are mostly acrylic painted on cloth. Their subject matter frequently incorporates images of women, symbolising for me, a larger sort of “human connectedness.” My themes are largely about “beings” interacting with each other and often include aspects and motifs of the natural surroundings in which I live.