Daphne Mackie
Botanical Artist
Daphne was born in Zimbabwe and has lived all over Southern Africa. She has painted the wild flowers of Africa for as long as she can remember. This passion grew from a deep empathy for the earth and the incredible beauty that sprang from its nurture. Her early childhood memories were those of wandering along tangled, virgin river banks, exploring the wonders of the wild, flowers, fruit and magnificent lowveld trees.
Daphne aptitude for art was encouraged and guided by the nuns and by a dedicated art mistress at school.
In 1970 she settled in Cape Town where Kirstenbosch Gardens with its wealth of Proteaceae and other indigenous flora inspired her to take up formal botanical illustrating to capture the beauty of these flowers. As she struggled to capture the translucency of the flowers, her daughter Sarah, well known for her replicas of bushman art on silk, taught her, her technique.
Daphne has become well known in Cape Town for her rendering of floral art on silk. She had a standing invitation to demonstrate this technique at the National Botanical Gardens Protea Show at Kirstenbosch from 1995 to 1999.
She exhibited at the Celebration of 300 years of Botanical Illustration at the Cape at Bertrams House Museum in the Government Gardens, Cape Town and she has a standing invitation to exhibit at the Cape Floral Show.
Daphne exhibits regularly with the Cape Artists Society at Kirstenbocsh.
Gallery of previous works by Daphne Mackie.