Mary Ellen Edwards

Mary Ellen Edwards (9 November 1838 – 22 December 1934), also known as MEE, was a British artist and illustrator. She contributed to many newspapers, periodicals and children's books.

Biography

Early life

Mary Ellen Edwards was born the daughter of farmer Mary Johnson and Downes Edwards, a farmer and engineer who had a number of successful inventions. She was born on her father's farm in Surbiton on 9 November 1838. She came from an artistic family. Her uncle was Edward Killingworth Johnson and her mother's uncle was James Wright, both Members of the Royal Watercolour Society.

The family moved frequently. In 1848, her father built the Ravenscliffe Lodge in Douglas, Isle of Man for the family to reside in. They eventually returned to London, living in Pimlico, South Kensington and Chelsea.

On 13 June 1866, Edwards married John Freer. Freer worked for the Peninsular and Oriental Company, a steam navigation service. Edwards and Freer had one son, John E. L. Freer, born in 1867. Edward's first husband (Freer) died in 1869. At this time and over the following decade Mary Ellen was submitting her work to the annual Royal Academy shows.

In 1872 she married the artist John Charles Staples (1844–1897), with whom she worked on many projects until his death at the end of the century.

Education

Due to her location early on in life, she was unable to receive much formal training in art. She did, however, attend South Kensington School of Art for one term. She moved frequently as a child and even as an adult, preventing extended periods of education at one place.

Career She started her artistic career at an early year in the medium of watercolor. At age 12, she switched from watercolor to oil. Outside of watercolor and engraving, Edwards was a successful illustrator, drawing her works on a wooden medium.

In 1959, Checkmated, a self-made design was displayed on the cover of Illustrated Times, a weekly illustrated news magazine in Britain.

Style and influence Mary Ellen Edwards worked and lived in both the 19th and early 20th centuries. Due to the prevailing social climate of the time, she was not very popular among a society that viewed her art through the traditional male lens. She focused more on illustrations that conveyed emotion in a social setting, and she was extremely successful at it. Furthermore, many of her works revolve around social settings with groups of people. She was exceptional at illustrating emotion in her work, and her pieces are very powerful and easy to understand. Unfortunately her style did not catch on among the broad population due to her status as a member of "feminine art"; her works were often viewed as "feminine", "sentimental", and "domestic": rarely equitably compared with her male counterparts.

Example of book illustration by Edwards

The following illustrations were painted by Edwards for Through the Meadows (1885) by Frederic Edward Weatherly (1848-1929). As well as the 24 colour illustrations by Edwards, there were as many silluoutes by John C. Staples. These images are by courtesy of the Osborne Collection of Early Children's Books at the Toronto Public Library.

Artistic works Idle Hours I Wandered by the Brookside The Last Kiss In Memoriam Good-bye Checkmated That Boy of Northcott's (illustrated) Pleading for Peace The Old Church Path Rosalind and Celia The Dance of Death