Lady Mabel Marguerite Annesley HRUA was a wood-engraver and watercolour painter.
21 Facts About Mabel Annesley
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Mabel Annesley's work is in many collections, including the British Museum, the Victoria and Albert Museum, the National Gallery of Canada and the Museum of New Zealand.
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Mabel Annesley exhibited in the Festival of Britain in 1952.
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Mabel Annesley was born on 25 February 1881, at Annesley Lodge, Regent's Park, London, the daughter of Hugh Annesley, 5th Earl Annesley, lieutenant-colonel in the Scots Fusilier Guards and landowner, and his first wife, Mabel Wilhelmina Frances Markham, Countess Annesley.
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Mabel Annesley's mother was the greatgranddaughter of Sir Francis Grant, eminent Victorian portrait painter and president of the Royal Academy.
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Mabel Annesley's half-sister, Lady Constance Malleson was a writer, actress, and mistress of Bertrand Russell.
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Mabel Annesley was initially taught at home, then in 1895, at fourteen, she began study at the Frank Calderon School of Animal Painting in London.
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Mabel Annesley's husband died in 1913, and a year later she inherited Castlewellan Castle after the death of her brother Francis.
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Mabel Annesley moved back to the Castle in 1914, and reverted to her maiden name.
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The Castle was home to a world-famous arboretum, with Mabel Annesley working hard to recover from losses incurred due to death duties.
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Mabel Annesley was regarded as one of its three or four leading exponents in Britain along with artists like Gwen Raverat and Robert Gibbings.
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Mabel Annesley exhibited 27 prints with the Society of Wood Engravers between 1922 and 1939, being elected a member in 1925.
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Mabel Annesley exhibited at her studio 12 Lombard Street, Belfast in 1925, lecturing on wood-engraving.
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Mabel Annesley illustrated a number of volumes for the Golden Cockerel Press, including Songs from Robert Burns, and for Duckworths County Down Songs and Apollo in Mourne by the Ulsterman Richard Rowley.
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Mabel Annesley exhibited with the Watercolour Society of Ireland in 1926, with the Dublin Painters in 1938, and was included in a 1930 exhibition of Irish art held in Brussels.
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Mabel Annesley designed pageant costumes with William Conor for the 1500th anniversary of the landing of St Patrick at Saul, County Down held in 1932 at Castle Ward, Strangford.
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Mabel Annesley moved home several times, living in Belfast, Connemara and in Rathfriland.
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Mabel Annesley was a trustee of the Bishop Suter Art Gallery in Nelson whilst living in New Zealand, purchasing for the board when she visited England.
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Lady Mabel Annesley died of myelomatosis on 19 June 1959 in Clare, Suffolk, and was buried in Long Melford, Suffolk.
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Mabel Annesley left an unfinished autobiography called As the Sight Is Bent, which was published by the Museum Press in 1964.
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Mabel Annesley is commemorated by an Ulster History Circle blue plaque at the Arboretum, Castlewellan Forest Park, County Down.