This specialized art form combines art and botany and both interests were nurtured from childhood in a family of artists and amateur naturalists who lived with the Australian “bush” at their back door.  These interests continued throughout her four years at art school and further strengthened while a museum artist and on the full-time staff as the botanical illustrator for the Queensland Herbarium where she produced hundreds of fine illustrations for many botanical texts.  A period as a freelance natural science illustrator followed before she found her present niche where she is viewed as an inspiring teacher and painter of works that are imbued with an artistic vitality and vibrancy – while maintaining attention to exquisite botanical detail.

Margaret established and then directed The Margaret Saul School of Botanic Art Brisbane, Australia established in 1997 - after having conducted botanical art classes at the Brisbane Botanic Gardens, Mt. Coot-tha since 1988.  She closed the school at the end of the school year in December 2003 and instigated the formation of the Botanical Artists Society of Queensland that has continued an instructional role and boasts a substantial membership.  Since moving to the USA in 2000, she has conducted master classes in Australia at Sydney, Katoomba and Brisbane and across the USA in - Arizona, Colorado, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New York, North Carolina, Virginia and Washington DC.  Several of these were presented as part of the Botanical Master Class series, organized by Dr. Shirley Sherwood (UK) – owner of a prestigious collection of contemporary botanical art. As an artist in the Sherwood collection, Margaret has been represented in worldwide exhibitions including Australia, Japan, South Africa, UK and at the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of Natural History in Washington DC.  She is also represented in public and private collections in Australia, The Netherlands and USA and her paintings are reproduced in a number of art books (Refer to CV).  She is the Director of the Brookside Gardens School of Botanical Art & Illustration in Bethesda, Maryland for which she has designed policy and curriculum.

Qualifications and Awards
1970    Diploma commercial Illustration (4 years full-time)
       The Art School, Central Technical College, Brisbane

1970    The Art School’s Award of Merit – the Final Year Student Prize

1988    Instructional Skills certificate
       Bald Hills College of TAFE