Mary Sargant Florence

Mary Sargant Florence (21 July 1857 – 14 December 1954) was a British painter of figure subjects, mural decorations in fresco and occasional landscapes in watercolour and pastel.

She was born in London, née Sargant; a brother was the sculptor Francis William Sargant. She studied in Paris under Luc-Olivier Merson and at the Slade School under Alphonse Legros. She was a member of the New English Art Club and the Society of Painters in Tempera.

In 1888 she married Henry Smyth Florence, an American musician. They had two children: Philip Sargant Florence, the economist, and Alix Strachey, the psychoanalyst and translator of Freud. After her husband's death by drowning in 1891, she moved to Marlow, Buckinghamshire, and built her house "Lordswood" (1899–1900), where she lived until 1940.

She is known for her works Children at Chess (c.1903), Suffer Little Children to Come unto Me (1913) and Pentecost (c.1913). She painted fresco decorations at the Old School, Oakham, Rutland (c.1909–14), and at Bournville Junior School near Birmingham (1912–14). Her frescoes at Oakham School were commissioned by the headmaster, her brother, Walter Lee Sargant, and illustrate the Arthurian story of Gareth.

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