SOMERVILLE, Jenny

1945 - ?

Jenny Scott Somerville was born in Leeds in June 1945, second of the three daughters of Charles Forbes Somerville (9 July 1906-1986), a farm foreman, and his wife Nesta née Thomas (born 23 November 1913), who married at Cuckfield, Sussex in 1942, the family moved very soon after Jenny's birth to a farm in Suffolk. Her aunt was artist Peggy Somerville and her uncle was artist Stuart Somerville. Jenny was educated at Wilby House School and at Felixstowe College, Suffolk and studied at Colchester School of Art and has since lived and worked in Suffolk. Jenny was surrounded by art from an early age, with many of her relatives being involved in the art world and, growing up on a Suffolk farm, developed her deep love of wildlife and the enjoyment of the beautiful landscape of her surroundings, supplemented by annual holidays in Wales which began her lifelong fascination with the sea. In 1966 she had her studio at Brook Cottage, Saxmundham, Suffolk where she worked as a free-lance artist, when her work included glass engraving, miniature painting, and book illustration. A painter and illustrator in oil, acrylic, pastel, pencil also working on decorative pieces on reclaimed wood. She married firstly in 1969, George Alexander Easson Melville (born 1941) and secondly in 1975, Nicholas Oldfield Ratcliff (born 1944). She later moved to Moat Farm, Leiston, Suffolk.

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Works by This Artist