If there was ever a flower born Ann Proctor would have given birth to it by painting it.

Ms Proctor is a well-known and talented artist who paints flowers, plants and fruits and uses watercolours as her medium.

Over the years she has been in numerous exhibitions, but Ms Proctor is a shy artist and prefers to remain in the shadows and let her work to speak for itself.

Ms Proctor, who moved to Bermuda from Wiltshire almost 36 years ago, is exhibiting as part of the Masterworks Foundation ?Artist Up Front Street? and her show opens on Friday.

Ms Proctor was an unexpected artist and fell into the art world quite by mistake.

?It was such a shock when it happened,? she said, ?I had started painting as a hobby and I took them into Heritage House to get them framed and the woman there asked if I would put them in the show.

?So I put them in and they all sold ? I was just speechless. It was like a magic moment.?

Ms Proctor said when she paints time loses all meaning.

?You see I can?t meditate, but it is a bit like meditating,? she said, ?With painting I can still my mind. I paint and I go on and on and I think, oh golly it?s 3.30 in the morning.?

She said her desire to paint is something that has been with her for a while.

?My inspiration comes from my love of flowers,? said Ms Proctor, ? And my favourite flower to paint is any white flower. Whenever I am inspired I just paint.?

The show is a retrospective she said and some of the paintings that will be on show are owned by Henry Laing.

She does not call her paintings botanicals because they are not exact.

?If I spoke to you about botanicals than someone would say there are not enough hairs on that leaf,? she said, ?It is very precise ? so you have to say that they are bordering on botanicals.?

Ms Proctor, who lives in one of the houses that author Mark Twain lived in, is not a plein air artist and paints on her kitchen table.

?When I go away I try and do some paintings as well,? she said.

Some of the samplings in the show will be paintings of apples, both white and blue Bermudianas, gladiolas, acorns, frangipanis, magnolias, bay grapes and loquats.

She had a piece of rain flowers and she said it was a piece that she did not want to sell.

?When you sell your paintings it is like losing something special,? she said, ?And you wonder whether it has gone to a good home.?

The show, entitled ?Watercolours?, opens at 5.30 p.m. until 7 p.m. at the Masterworks Gallery, on Bermuda House Lane, Hamilton.