Original Tempera on Panel 'A Steep Climb' by Colleen Farr - Signed c.1975

Colleen trained at the Royal College of art after the war, specialising in textile design. She went on to become a full time artist, exhibiting regularly at the Royal Academy summer exhibition. She taught on the Textile Design Course at the Central School of Art and Design from 1966 for over twenty years and became Head of Department. She trained at the Royal College of Art and designed for Liberty from 1953 to 1965. She was their first resident designer. Her success at Liberty was established with the receipt the same year of a gold medal at the Sacremento International Fair for 'Blackberry' designed in 1955 and via other fashion fabrics designed for and used by Mary Quant, Jean Muir, Foale and Tuffin and others. From 1962 she worked on a free-lance basis for Liberty as well as Heals, Graftons, Cepea, Tootal and other firms. The Farr donation to the V & A covers the period 1954 to c.1970 and is an important collection of Mid Century postwar textile material in their collection.