Scottish artist Dame Elizabeth Blackadder dies, aged 89

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Dame Elizabeth Blackadder diesImage source, PA Media

Dame Elizabeth Blackadder, one of Scotland's greatest artists, has died at the age of 89.

She was the first woman to be elected to both the Royal Scottish Academy and the Royal Academy.

The Scottish Gallery confirmed she had died peacefully at her home in Edinburgh on Monday.

During her 60-year career, she won numerous awards for her work and in 2001 was appointed Her Majesty's Painter and Limner in Scotland.

She was well known for her delicate paintings of flowers and still life subjects.

Her work can be seen at the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art, the Tate Gallery and the Museum of Modern Art in New York, and has featured on a series of Royal Mail stamps.

Image source, PA Media
Image caption,
Dame Elizabeth Blackadder pictured with Alex Salmond when he was first minister, at the unveiling of his Christmas card in 2012

Born in Falkirk, she studied at Edinburgh University College of Art from 1949 to 1954.

She won scholarships to pursue her painting in southern Europe, and later married fellow painter John Houston.

Her first solo exhibition was in Edinburgh in 1959, and she lectured at Edinburgh College of Art for more than two decades.

Guy Peploe, a director at the Scottish Gallery, said: "Elizabeth was without question one of our greatest artists, as well-known in London as Scotland.

"She was very important to the gallery with an exhibition history of over 60 years, and will be hugely missed by all who knew her."

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