Nancy Margaret Tichborne ( Keedwell; 27 August 1942 – 10 February 2023) was a New Zealand watercolour artist. She specialised in paintings of flowers; her work has appeared on calendars, diaries, cards and postage stamps in New Zealand and internationally.

Biography

Tichborne was born in Levin on 27 August 1942 to Peggy (née Watkins) and Harvey Keedwell, and grew up in

Hāwera Hāwera is the second-largest centre in the Taranaki region of New Zealand's North Island, with a population of . It is near the coast of the South Taranaki Bight. The origins of the town lie in a government military base that was established i ...

, in the North Island of New Zealand. She was the second of three daughters; her sisters were Mary Browne, a cookbook writer, and the food anthropologist

Helen Leach Helen May Leach (née Keedwell; born 3 July 1945) is a New Zealand academic specialising in food anthropology. She is currently a professor emerita at the University of Otago. Early life and family Born Helen May Keedwell in Wellington on 3 J ...

. In 1952, the family moved to

Dunedin Dunedin ( ; mi, Ōtepoti) is the second-largest city in the South Island of New Zealand (after Christchurch), and the principal city of the Otago region. Its name comes from , the Scottish Gaelic name for Edinburgh, the capital of Scotland. Th ...

and Tichborne attended

Otago Girls' High School , motto_translation = The Right Education Makes The Heart As Strong As Oak , type = State , grades = 9 - 13 , grades_label = Years , gender = Girls-only , established = ; years ago , address = 41 Tennyson Street ...

. On leaving high school, she went to London on a scholarship and studied art at

St Martin's School of Art Saint Martin's School of Art was an art school, art college in London, England. It offered foundation and degree level courses. It was established in 1854, initially under the aegis of the church of St Martin-in-the-Fields. Saint Martin's beca ...

from 1960 to 1962. In 1964, she returned to Dunedin for a short time and her work was included in an exhibition there. She then went on to work in Hong Kong as a fashion illustrator for the ''

South China Morning Post The ''South China Morning Post'' (''SCMP''), with its Sunday edition, the ''Sunday Morning Post'', is a Hong Kong-based English-language newspaper owned by Alibaba Group. Founded in 1903 by Tse Tsan-tai and Alfred Cunningham, it has remained ...

'' and a fashion designer for an American fashion house between 1964 and 1965, before spending the next five years in England and Wales. In 1970, Tichborne returned to New Zealand and settled in

Rotorua Rotorua () is a city in the Bay of Plenty region of New Zealand's North Island. The city lies on the southern shores of Lake Rotorua, from which it takes its name. It is the seat of the Rotorua Lakes District, a territorial authority encompass ...

. She worked part-time as an art teacher and collaborated with her sisters Helen Leach and Mary Browne on a series of cookbooks, providing the watercolour artwork for them. In 1984, Tichborne and her husband Bryan founded the New Zealand Calendar Company, and started producing calendars with a New Zealand focus. Their first calendar featured

fishing flies An artificial fly or fly lure is a type of fishing lure, usually used in the sport of fly fishing (although they may also be used in other forms of angling). In general, artificial flies are an imitation of aquatic insects that are natural food ...

, and later titles featured flowers and cats. Their 39th and last calendar was produced in 2010. In 1997, Tichborne designed a series of postage stamps and a first day cover for

New Zealand Post NZ Post ( mi, Tukurau Aotearoa), shortened from New Zealand Post, is a state-owned enterprise responsible for providing postal service in New Zealand. The New Zealand Post Office, a government agency, provided postal, banking, and telecommunica ...

depicting vineyards of New Zealand. Her artwork was also used on stamps of Bhutan and the Pitcairn Islands. In the 1990s, Tichborne released a series of DVDs on watercolour technique.

Recognition

In 2007, Tichborne was appointed patron of Watercolour New Zealand. She remained in that position for 12 years.

Personal life and death

In 1963, Tichborne met Bryan Tichborne—at that time a soldier undertaking officer training at Sandhurst—in Killarney, Ireland, and the couple married in Hong Kong in 1965. They had three sons. In 1994, the couple moved to a property at French Farm, near

Akaroa Akaroa is a small town on Banks Peninsula in the Canterbury Region of the South Island of New Zealand, situated within a harbour of the same name. The name Akaroa is Kāi Tahu Māori for "Long Harbour", which would be spelled in standard ...

in Canterbury. Tichborne established a garden there that in 2011 was designated a Garden of Significance by the New Zealand Gardens Trust. The couple subsequently moved to a smaller property in Akaroa. Tichborne died at her home in Akaroa on 10 February 2023, at the age of 80.

Publications

* Browne, M., Tichborne, N., & Leach, H. M. (1980). ''The cook's garden: For cooks who garden and gardeners who cook''. Wellington: Reed. *Burton, D., Tichborne, N., & Ashton, J. (1983). ''Two hundred years of New Zealand food and cookery''. Wellington: Reed. *Browne, M., Leach, H. M., & Tichborne, N. (1983). ''The Australian bread book''. Sydney: Doubleday Australia. *Leach, H. M., & Tichborne, N. (1984). ''1,000 years of gardening in New Zealand''. Wellington N.Z.: Reed. *Burton, D., & Tichborne, N. (1987). ''New Zealand food & cookery''. Auckland, N.Z.: Mural Books. *Burton, D., & Tichborne, N. (1987). ''David Burton's New Zealand food and cookery''. Auckland, N.Z: David Bateman. *Browne, M., Leach, H., & Tichborne, N. (1987). ''More from the cook's garden''. Auckland: Reed Methuen. *Browne, M., Leach, H. M., & Tichborne, N. (1989). ''The cook's bread book''. Auckland N.Z.: Heinemann Reed. *Tichborne, N., & Tichborne, B. (1990). ''Anglers' paradise: Favourite fishing waters of New Zealand and the flies to fish them with''. Auckland, N.Z: Bush Press. *Browne, M., Leach, H. H. M., & Tichborne, N. (1996). ''The New Zealand bread book''. Godwit: Auckland, N.Z. *Tichborne, N. (1999). ''Nancy Tichborne's flowers''. Auckland, N.Z: Godwit. *Browne, M., Tichborne, N., & Leach, H. M. (2000). ''The cook's salad garden''. Milsons Point, N.S.W: Random House Australia. *Tichborne, N. (2000). ''Nancy Tichborne's cats''. Auckland: Godwit. *Browne, M., Leach, H. M., & Tichborne, N. (2001). ''The cook's herb garden''. Auckland, N.Z: Godwit. * Tichborne, N. (2008). ''Nancy Tichborne's watercolour world: The creative process explored''. Akaroa, N.Z: New Zealand Calendar Company Ltd. *

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Tichborne, Nancy 1942 births 2023 deaths People from Levin, New Zealand 21st-century New Zealand painters 20th-century New Zealand painters People educated at Otago Girls' High School People from Hāwera New Zealand stamp designers Alumni of Saint Martin's School of Art New Zealand expatriates in Hong Kong New Zealand women painters New Zealand watercolourists 21st-century New Zealand women artists 20th-century New Zealand women artists 20th-century women painters 21st-century women painters