Gerrard studied at the
Slade School of Art from 1922 to 1924 and won several prizes while there. These included the first prize for painting from the cast in 1922, a prize for life painting and, in 1923, a first prize for portrait painting. While at the Slade, she met her future husband
Alfred Gerrard who later became head of the Slade sculpture department and then professor of sculpture at the college. The couple married in 1933 and lived in an old farmhouse in Kent. While her husband developed his teaching career and completed several public commissions, Gerrard continued to paint, work on pottery and sculpture and develop a country garden. She painted on either the
Sussex Downs or the
South Downs on an almost daily basis. During World War II, Gerrard painted a number of rural scenes showing crashed planes and bomb damage. At least one of these was purchased by the
War Artists' Advisory Committee. Gerrard also painted more abstract works often with a heavily symbolic content, sometimes with Christian elements. In 1991, an exhibition of her work was held at the
Royal Museum & Art Gallery in Canterbury. This led to a reappraisal of her work and a number of British museums and galleries acquired examples of her art. These included the
Tate, the
Imperial War Museum and the
Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge. ==References==