Joan G Edwards - early years
Joan Pascoe (her maiden name - issued from a Cornish family) demonstrated a strong talent for the visual arts in her early teens
and was given special permission to attend art college while still at school. That is where she produced the low relief plaster cast shown below
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St. John (1937) bas relief plaster cast collection of the artist |
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After war service in the drawing office of the Bristol Aircraft Company, she was able to return to the West of England College of Art for a full, five year course of study, her painting tutors being George Sweet and Paul Feiler. This was a traditional, rigorous training in life drawing, anatomy, modelling, etc. as well as painting, with calligraphy as a second study. Women students were very poorly treated at the time, frequently the object of sarcastic or dismissive comments. The head of the college indeed expressed the opinion that she was not ready to sit her final diploma exams and needed an extra year; Claude Rogers, visiting to assess the students' work, disagreed. "What's wrong with that, George?" he asked, pointing to the still life below. She was allowed to sit the exam.
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Still life (1951) oil on canvas collection of the artist |
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