Gertrude des Clayes

Gertrude des Clayes (1879 – 23 August 1949) was a Scottish-born artist who lived in England and Quebec, Canada. Des Clayes was best known as a portrait painter. Des Clayes moved to Montreal in 1912. In 1914, she was elected an associate of the Royal Canadian Academy of Arts. One of her portraits appeared in The Fine Arts in Canada by Newton MacTavish. She returned to England in 1936.

Des Clayes created a portrait of railway entrepreneur Sir William Mackenzie's mother, Mary, using photographs taken of Mary's sisters and by studying Mary's daughters and granddaughters; no photographs were available of Mary Mackenzie herself who had died 27 years before des Clayes was born.

Des Clayes died in London in 1949.

Her work is included in the collections of the Musée national des beaux-arts du Québec, National Gallery of Canada and the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts.