Tributes paid to popular Cookham artist and author,Juliette Palmer

Tributes have been paid to an award-winning Cookham artist who passed away last week.

After a short illness, 85-year-old Juliette Palmer died in hospital on Sunday, August 2.

Born in 1930 in Romford, Essex, influential Juliette, whose works now feature in many books devoted to the study of art, moved to Cookham in 1971 with her husband Dennis, 86.

In the 70s, she worked as a freelance children’s book illustrator from the studio in her Cookham home and later wrote and illustrated six of her own books for children which were published by Macmillan.

A devoted family woman herself, Juliette leaves behind daughter Biddy, son-in-law, Jon and 12-year-old granddaughter Tabitha.

Biddy, who still lives in the village, said: “She was fit and healthy and interested in art right up until the end.

“She was on holiday in Wales with my dad just last week and was taking photographs of waterfalls and collecting things for her next set of paintings.”

Always eager to meet people and talk to anyone with even a passing interest in art, Juliette opened up her studio in Cookham to the public during festivals and other events.

She was an elected Member of the Royal Society of British Artists (RBA) and an Invited Honorary Member of the Buckinghamshire Art Society.

Her work was repeatedly selected in the Hunting/Observer Art Prizes, the Singer and Friedlander/Sunday Times Watercolour Competition and the Laing Landscape Competition.

Among her prizes were the Laing Painting Competition, 1996, the Travel Prize, Royal Watercolour Society, 1996 and the St Cuthbert’s Mill Prize, Royal West of England Academy, 2000.