My mother, Mary Figg, an artist and designer, who has died aged 89, spent four decades in education as an art teacher, examiner and mentor.
After training at Guildford School of Art (1949-52), in Surrey, where she met my father, Peter Figg, a technical illustrator, whom she married in 1955, Mary won scholarships to attend the Royal Academy Schools (1952-55). There, she developed into a talented figurative painter, and was rewarded when her works were selected and sold in London galleries.
Her first post in art education was came in 1968 at Maiden Erlegh school, Reading, Berkshire, where the new department had been set up six years earlier by the artist Don Breckon. As head of art, Mary employed her creativity to develop art and design to a high standard. She excelled as a communicator and was inspirational, fired by a love of art history that she shared with her pupils and colleagues. Her teaching extended to leading life drawing at evening classes at Woodley Hill House, a community venue in Reading, and she helped establish the Berkshire Art and Design Teachers Association.
When my parents relocated to Cornwall, in 1980, Mary ran the art department at Wadebridge school and worked for the Associated Examining Board (now subsumed into the Southern Examining Group), initially as an examiner, then moderator, and, finally, chief examiner. In this capacity, she set standards in art education, travelling nationally and internationally.
Mary was generous and supportive in the mentoring and promotion of her colleagues. Moreover, she was passionate and committed to the development of her pupils, many of whom remember her as an instrumental influence on their lives. While excelling in her profession, she was also raising her family, a fairly rare achievement for a woman in the 1970s and 80s.
Born in Walton, Surrey, the daughter of Percy Oliver, an engineer, and Lillian Gertrude (nee Curtis), a nurse and accomplished embroiderer, Mary attended Guildford high school. During the war, she lived in West Wittering, West Sussex, as an evacuee with my grandmother, a nurse, in a converted tram on the seafront.
In retirement, despite being a cancer survivor and dialysis patient, she volunteered for Cancer Voices, the Peninsula Cancer Network (now Peninsula Cancer Alliance), was chair of the Royal Cornwall Hospitals patient and hospital forum and represented renal patients for the same trust’s Bodmin dialysis unit. She discovered new skills in embroidery and textile design, and belonged to the Cornwall Creative Textile Group, as well as enjoying her lifelong passion for gardening.
Mary is survived by Peter and their children, Karen, Simon, Adam and me.
