Rodella Anne Purves (6 July 1945 – 17 January 2008) was a British botanical artist. Purves was born in 1945 in Paisley,

Scotland Scotland (, ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a border with England to the southeast and is otherwise surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean to the ...

, and two years later moved to

Edinburgh Edinburgh ( ; gd, Dùn Èideann ) is the capital city of Scotland and one of its 32 Council areas of Scotland, council areas. Historically part of the county of Midlothian (interchangeably Edinburghshire before 1921), it is located in Lothian ...

with her family, where she attended St. Margaret's School. She received a degree in agriculture from Edinburgh and East of Scotland College of Agriculture. She trained at Cambridge as a seed tester. She spent a year in New Zealand, working for the government's Department of Industry, before returning to Edinburgh to work at the Royal Botanic Garden. Purves left the Botanic Garden in 1976 to concentrate on her career as a botanical artist. Her work was exhibited around the world, in the United States, Ireland, Japan and Germany, with the Queen's Royal Botanist describing her as one of Britain's leading artists. She was awarded the Jill Smythies Award in 1998. Purves died on 17 January 2008 in Edinburgh, Scotland.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Purves, Della 1945 births 2008 deaths 20th-century Scottish painters 20th-century Scottish women artists 21st-century Scottish painters 21st-century Scottish women artists Artists from Paisley, Renfrewshire People educated at St Margaret's School, Edinburgh Alumni of Scotland's Rural College Scottish people of Irish descent Scottish women painters