Jean Shepeard (1904-1989) was a well-known actress and artist. She studied art at the Slade School of Fine Art and then trained at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in 1925. Sharing a flat with Peggy Ashcroft, in 1928 she became a member of the Emotionist Group of painters, musicians, philosophers, poets and actors which had been founded by the artist R. O. Dunlop. In 1929 she exhibited with Francis Bacon and Roy de Maistre in Bacon's Queensbury Mews rooms and in the same year she showed with The Redfern Gallery, London. Her work was admired for the sensitivity, beauty of line, vigour and character of her drawings. Her drawings were then exhibited in 1933 in a one woman show at The Lefevre Gallery in London. Somewhat on the periphery of the Bloomsbury set, Jean Shepeard went on to exhibit with Vanessa Bell and others at the Modern Picture Library. She also performed in numerous plays at leading theatres along with John Gielgud, Jack Buchanan, Sybil Thorndike and others, and in her later years acting was the main focus of her working life.