About Wilhelmina Barns-Graham
Wilhelmina Barns-Graham CBE (8 June 1912 – 26 January 2004) was one of the foremost British abstract artists, a member of the influential Penwith Society of Arts. == Early life == Wilhelmina Barns-Graham, known as Willie, was born in St Andrews, Fife, on 8 June 1912, daughter of Allan Barns-Graham, head of a Scottish landed gentry family—he owned estates named Lymekilns and Cambuslang in Lanarkshire, Kirkhill in Ayrshire, Fereneze in Renfrewshire, and Carbeth Guthrie in Stirlingshire, Scotland—and his wife Wilhelmina Menzies, daughter of Charles Bayne Meldrum, whose family of minor Scottish gentry owned the estates of Dura and Balmungo, Fifeshire. Barns-Graham's parents were second cousins. As a child she showed very early signs of creative ability. It was at school that Wilhelmina decided that she wanted to be an artist after one of her paintings was chosen to be displayed on the wall there; she stated later in life that "painting chose me, not I it". == Education == After school she set her sights on Edinburgh College of Art where, after some dispute with her father, and six months at the Edinburgh College of Domestic Science, she enrolled in 1931. During her time at College Barns-Graham was taught by tutors including portrait painter David Alison and painter William MacTaggart, her friends there included the influential Scottish painters Robert MacBryde, Robert Colquhoun, Margaret Mellis and William Gear. Since birth Barns-Graham suffered from weakness of the lungs, exacerbated by stress or anxiety, and in 1933 she contracted pleurisy forcing her to take a break from College. Barns-Graham finally graduated with her diploma in 1936. == Early artistic career == After her education Barns-Graham made study trips to Paris, London and St Tropez before moving to St Ives, Cornwall in 1940 at the suggestion of the Edinburgh College of Art's Principal Hubert Wellington.
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