CHELSEA ILLUSTRATORS

1914 - 1939

The Chelsea Illustrators was founded by Muriel Olive Cecile Goulden in in the summer of 1914, when twenty or so women graduated from the Westminster School of Art and resolved to make art their careers. They elected their teacher, Muriel Goulden as president and their members included as hon. secretary Margaret Mary Tempest, and they found suitable premises in an old a barn located at 59a Park Walk, Chelsea, from where they taught, worked, and sold their work. It was a get-together of illustrators, a sort of a society, they made Christmas card designs and show card designs, and illustrated books, and in the back of them it had printed 'The Chelsea Illustrators' and giving the artist's name with any member who wanted the job would have it, when an order was received by 'The Chelsea Illustrators', it would be given to any member who requested it. Members included Mary Margaret (Mollie) Kaye (21 August 1908–29 January 2004), Joan G. Robinson (1910–1988), Elizabeth Alice Marjorie Montgomery [Wilmot] (1902–1993), Audrey Sophia Harris [Devine] (1900–1966) and Margaret Frances (Percy) Harris (1904–2000). It was disbanded in 1939 owing to the outbreak of the Second World War.