Today, we dive into the vibrant world of artist Daphne Clement, who paints picturesque scenes of Lower Sunbury and surrounding areas with a splash of colour and a heart full of stories. From her home gallery, Daphne shares her journey from the beaches of Dunkirk - where her father was rescued by a ship that bore her name - to her blossoming love for watercolour painting. She reflects on how her scientific background laid the groundwork for her artistic expression, proving that creativity can bloom from any field. With a palette filled with local landmarks and familiar faces, her art captures the essence of her community, reminding us that beauty often lies in the everyday. So grab your paintbrush or just your favorite snack, and let’s explore the life and colours of Daphne Clement!

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In this episode, we're in Lower Sunbury with artist Daphne Clement, whose colourful watercolors capture the river, the boatyards and the familiar corners of Lower Sunbury. Just over the fence from Shepperton and around Shepperton itself, I joined Daphne in her home gallery to talk about her life, her work and her art.

Daphne's story begins on the beaches of Dunkirk and with a little ship that shared her name.

My father was picked up from the beaches of Dunkirk and he was picked up by one of the little ships that came from this area. A lot of them went down the river, a lot of them came from the coast as well.

And they went over to the beaches and they picked up all the soldiers who. The Germans were, you know, moving in on them and the Luftwaffe were. It was. It must have been absolutely awful.

Her father never came home from the war.

Then my brother was born two years later and then my father was killed on the D Day landings. And my mother had this great sadness of losing everything that she felt was important. She had to bring us both up on her own.

She had to go through the birth and the loss of my father all in one go. It must have been awful for her anyway.

And she trained to be a teacher so that she could look after us in the holidays and work as a teacher during the term time.

So in the fullness of time she came to Hampton where she taught at the Hampton Junior School and my brother and I both went to the Hampton Junior School.

When Daphne was 10, her mother moved the family to the other side of Sunbury, hoping she'd earn a place at the grammar school.

She thought I would pass the 11 plus, but she wanted me to go to A co ed grammar school and there was one in Ashford.

So she moved us lock, stock and barrel from Hampton to the other side of Sunbury when I was 10 years old so that I could go to the Ashford County Grammar School.

Her mother, a teacher and soon a headmistress, steered her toward science rather than art.

When I was there, after the first year was over, we had to choose our subjects and I wanted to do art, English, literature and history, all of which I loved, but my mother said no, you do chemistry, physics and biology because you will get a good job with those subjects. So I did chemistry, physics and biology because when your mother's a teacher and about to become a headmistress, you don't argue with her.

I don't think I'd have argued with her anyway, but anyway, so I've never regretted doing chemistry, physics and biology. They're the basis of life, aren't they?

That decision led to a remarkable scientific career, one that would take her from Englefield Green to Cambridge University.

I had a wonderful job in science.

I went to college and I got more qualifications and I went to a laboratory up at Englefield Green which was very, very, very, very unusual because it was owned by a German called Mr. Whittle and he imported the very first electron microscopes in the whole country. And I learnt to prepare specimens for the microscope, to work the microscope.

And in the fullness of time there were scientists who came with their specimens and I had to prepare them, show them, photograph them.

The magnification was amazing and we had lots of very interesting people who came with their problems because we were the only place in the country where we could show them what was happening to whatever it was they were working with. And I was involved with the very first people who produced long life milk and fast freezing.

We could show people what happened with slow freezing and with fast freezing. And at the age of 18 I, I was sent to Aberdeen.

I had to wait for the trawlers to come in and then tell the captains and the people involved with the freezing of the fish. I had to tell them how to freeze their fish. Can you imagine how well that went down?

An 18 year old girl waiting for them to land and I was telling them how to freeze it.

After generations of them doing it their own way, which of course was a slower way and in the slow way the cells burst open, whereas if you fast freeze the cells stay the same size. But of course they only found this out because of the electron microscopes.

And then later on Cambridge University had its first electron microscope and I had to go there to show them how to use it.

From the microscopes of Cambridge to the colours of the Thames. That next turn came years later when.

I met my husband to be. We decided to get married.

I was 20 and then I had three children and by the time they were old enough, you know, that it didn't need all my time and attention and all the rest of it. It wasn't until I was about 35, 40 that I had the time to have a little go at painting.

I think I knew I always wanted to paint because I wanted to do art, didn't I? And I thought, I know what I'll do. I'll join an adult education art class and learn the basics through them.

So I joined one at Walton, went to the first lesson and the guy there, who I got to know really very well, he saw what I'd been fiddling around with during the class and he said to me, this class is not for you. You don't need to come here. He said, I'm going to redo your fees and I will introduce you to Sunbury Art Group. So I went to Sunbury Art Group.

By this time I was sort of 35, 40, and I just started painting and I never had a lesson. And, you know, I think it's a really good thing because quite possibly if you go to art school, they're more likely to teach you how to.

To paint like somebody else. Whereas I found my own way and I've thoroughly enjoyed it ever since.

For Daphne, it was less about technique and more about instinct and a deep affection for the place she calls home. After rediscovering painting, Daphne's world became one of colour, community and the local scenes that define Sunbury.

There is so much to paint and I've been painting ever since, and I'm now 82. I've been painting for about 40 years. One of the very first ones I did was the clock tower when it was in the middle of the five road intersection.

And I've still got a lot of the pen and ink drawings I did.

She tells me her work has always started close to home, painting what she loves rather than what she's told to paint.

I like to pick out the important bits and I love color. I don't like a lot of detail, but I like to hint at detail.

I mean, I suppose, really I can't talk about art because I don't know what there is to talk about. I just do it.

Yeah.

Do you know what I mean? If there are details, I don't particularly like to see and I don't want to spend a lot of time doing details. Then I don't put it in.

But I do like to find the colour even where, you know, there isn't a lot of color. You can usually see just a hint of a nice light green or.

We're standing in front of her painting of Wilson's boats, a familiar sight to anyone who's walked along the river.

I've just done another one, I think. I've painted Wilson's boatyard at least five times from different angles and different lights and different.

And of course, now there are no boats there because it's not a boatyard anymore. But I did another painting only a month or so back because the new people have just moved in there wanted a picture from the other side of the river, looking back and do you know, although it's still got George Wilson Boatyard on the side of the building, they're going to have it repainted, but they're going to have it repainted with that old sign still there, because they feel it's part of its history.

It's a theme that runs through much of her work, painting what's here and sometimes what's no longer here.

I've probably got, it must be getting on towards 100 different cards of the area. No shop is going to do that anyway. It's an easy way of showing off what you do.

People buy my cards and they buy the calendar and they go all over the world.

Now, sometimes, of course, it's to people who have lived here and they've still got connections, but I think sometimes people send them just to show this is where I live.

Her pictures have traveled far beyond Sunbury, but they've always carried a sense of place.

I like to play with the titles. I did a painting for a cousin of mine who was getting married.

She lives in Bermuda and she came to school in this country and she loved the swans, but they don't have swans in Bermuda. And so I did a painting called Seven Swans are Swimming in Sunbury on Thames.

We step into her gallery walls full of river scenes, village life and a lifetime of memories.

This is my gallery and I used to bring people in through the garage and it meant they didn't have to come in the house. But I'm not so fussy anymore. So, you see, this is an example of the cards I've done. And colour is one of the things I love.

And when I saw that boat there with those reflections, I had to paint it I don't do a lot of sketching.

I tend to just get straight into it.

Well, unless there's a reason why I can't. Like when I was doing Wilson's Boat the other day with. I was on a boat run by the ferry, you know, the ferry. So I only had a few minutes.

So I did do a little tiny sketch, but I don't normally do that. This is Hampton, basically, and the Sum of Shepparton. And this. These are from all over the place. Yes.

Everywhere you look, there's something familiar. A corner of Sunbury passed a hundred times, seen here in fresh light. It is amazing being in here, actually.

Not that I haven't been in an art gallery before, but that everywhere I look. I know.

You know?

Yeah. It's somewhere from around here. Yes, it's quite incredible.

These are things.

So that's the idea of the calendars.

And of course, everybody missed it. Yeah. So I've had to do it again.

She points to a painting of the Thames from the bell tower, a view that links her work to the landscape she's painted for decades.

Do you remember Dennis Brock, the old. The old guy who was the chief bell ringer? He took me up to the top of the bell tower and that's the view from the top of.

And that's Wilson's Ferry again.

Yeah. I asked Daphne which piece feels most like her. She takes a moment, looks around and smiles.

Oh, you know, this is one. This is one of my most favourites. It's one of the latest ones I've done as well. And I... I love that one. The Middle Thames Yacht Club.

It's just looking down and this is most of Sunbury village is here. Oh, and look at the Salvation army band.

There's a piece for every mood, isn't there?

Yes, there is a piece for every mood. And that I did for my husband's 80th birthday. Because it was the year of the tiger. I did it for his birthday card.

Among the stories in her gallery, one painting carries a different kind of weight.

When my husband died, I couldn't paint. It's about, I don't know, four or five, six months. I just couldn't paint. I just. I just couldn't.

And I was talking to a neighbour on the street and this guy came up and he said, to me. Oh, he said, you're the artist, aren't you? My wife and I want one of your paintings, please, or a print of one of your paintings.

Most of all, he said, we want you to paint our dog. We share the dog with my son who lives in London, and we love the dog. I said, look, I'm sorry, I'm not painting at the moment at all.

I don't paint animals. I never have painted animals and I really can't do. But he said, we really want you to do our dog. We really want you to paint the dog.

He had the dog there and I pointed at the dog. I said, what's the dog's name? I thought I was taking his mind off things. I was certainly taking my mind off him. Do you know what the dog's name was?

It wasn't Daphne, was it?

It was Roger, my husband's name. Oh, my word. My husband's name was Roger. There's Roger. And do you know, I had to go around and paint Roger because he was called Roger.

And it got me painting again.

In a final room, Daphne shows me some of her earliest work drawings of a Sunbury that's largely disappeared.

Got all these out the other day. There's that one, that was one of the very first ones. I used to wait for the bus for school near that.

And the old men, they did used to lean on the railings nattering, that's the butcher down in the village. And all those shops, they've all gone, haven't they? That's where the post office used to be.

Oh, here we are, look, the flower pot. When it had that old building on the side. Oh, wow.

For anyone starting out, Daphne has a simple message.

I had somebody around here once who said, painting's very, very difficult, isn't it? And I said, doesn't have to be. And I put a piece of paper up and I put all this blue and, you know, a bit of sunshine there.

And then when it was nearly dry, I put in the trees. That took 10 minutes. So I said, it doesn't have to be difficult.

A lifetime in pictures and a village preserved in watercolour. My thanks to Daphne Clement for her time and for the colour she's added to our corner of the Thames.

You can see photos of Daphne's gallery and some of the works we talked about in this week's newsletter, which you can subscribe to for free at thesheppertonian.uk Also, if you're a local business and would like your brand alongside stories like this, you'll find the details there too. Hear this the Sheppertonian Shout Out Today's Sheppertonian shout out comes from Kim Penfold, an ex Shepperton resident.

Kim, I'm so glad you listen in to catch up with everything Shepperton. And thanks for your comments on posts and general positivity.

Kim has commented about a previous episode with Alice Shanahan about the local craft fair. She says Alice's vision for a larger scale event with food stalls, etc. definitely has potential, especially if it builds on the current success of the craft market. Events like that can become real fixtures in the local calendar, drawing in visitors and supporting small businesses in a meaningful way.

And Alice is absolutely right about the joint artisan shops. We have them where I live and they're such a lifeline for high streets, especially in areas where footfall has declined.

A collaborative space not only reduces overheads for individual makers, but also creates a vibrant, ever changing retail experience that keeps people coming back.

If they can do a deal on a closed unit and a landlord sees the long term benefit, community engagement, increased traffic and even potential for long term lease, surely it could be a win win. Thanks for that Kim and fingers crossed someone from the council is listening. That's all for this episode of the Sheppartonian.

Don't forget, if you like what you heard in this episode and think a friend or a neighbour or a work colleague might enjoy it too, then share it with them. Send them the web address which is thesheppertonian.uk and until next time, take care and see you around.