Shelagh Wakely (b. 1932, Madingley – 2011, London) was a pioneer of installation art. Born in the small village of Madingley, Cambridgeshire, in 1932, Wakely spent much of her youth in Kenya where her family lived a privileged colonial life. She returned to England as a teenager to study agriculture, but quickly turned to the arts, studying painting and screen-printing at the Chelsea College of Art (1958-1962). Wakely worked as a textile and clothing designer through the 1960s but a research fellowship at the Royal College of Art (1968-1971) led her to turn to sculpture. Early exhibitions were held at the Serpentine Gallery, London, (1977); ICA, London, (1979) and John Hansard Gallery, Southampton (1982). These shows cemented her reputation as a multifaceted artist: installations, sculptures, drawings and paintings all incorporated across the breadth of her practice.
