Joanna English Painted Nature

About Joanna

Joanna works as a Natural History Illustrator from her studio at home in Northumberland, situated in a small village at the foot of the Cheviot Hills.

Joanna was born and grew up in the New Forest in Hampshire where her interest in drawing and wildlife developed from an early age. The wonderful freedom to roam just about anywhere in the New Forest made it possible to explore, discover and learn much about the flora and fauna of the area throughout the seasons. Either on horseback or on foot Joanna enjoys observing wildlife and picking up interesting finds to identify and sketch.

Joanna started her professional career as an artist working at Marwell Zoological Park near Winchester. Here she spent a wonderful year painting the identification boards for display around the zoo and supplying pen and ink illustrations for their publications.

Following this Joanna decided to study Natural History Illustration on a four-year course and graduated in 1991 and during this time she was a finalist in the Readers Digest Young Illustrator of the Year two years running.

Since then Joanna has worked on a variety of commissions, which include illustrating children's books.

Her home life involves bringing up three children, one of whom has Autism, and looking after a menagerie of animals which are a great source of inspiration and reference for her artwork. Joanna takes a wholesome and organic approach to life, growing vegetables in her garden, collecting eggs from her chickens and she allows part of her grazing land to be left to grow wild during the summer months to attract butterflies, bumble bees and other wildlife.