Biography
Jean Shepeard (1904-1990) was an actress and an artist who trained at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art (RADA). She once shared a flat with Peggy Ashcroft and became a member of the Emotionist group of painters, musicians, philosophers, poets and actors. In 1930 she exhibited with Francis Bacon and Roi de Mestre in Bacon's Queensbury Mews rooms, then described as a 'studio for modern interior decoration'. She was also a fringe member of the Bloomsbury set and exhibited with Vanessa Bell, R. O. Dunlop and others at the Modern Picture Library. Her portraits include those of Francis Bacon, JB Priestly, Peggy Ashcroft and Vanessa Bell. Little-known during her lifetime Jean Shepeard came to public attention when after her death drawings and sketchbooks were found in a hidden chest.
Contemporary reviewers had praised the sensitivity, beauty of line, vigour and character of her drawings of heads, while Bacon's and De Maistre's paintings were thought to be mainly intended as decoration, adapted to 'the ambient style of the room in which they hang'. Later, critic Gui St Bernard would write that 'Miss Shepeard is mistress of the difficult art of elimination' but she was better remembered for her theatre acting, performing alongside John Gielgud, Anthony Quayle, Sybil Thorndike, amongst others and progressed to a moderately successful film career.