Painter and teacher, born in St.Andrews, Fife. She attended Edinburgh College of Art, 1932-7, having a studio in the Scottish capital, 1936-40.

In the latter year Barns-Graham pursued an Andrew Grant post-graduate travelling scholarship and went to live in St.Ives, Cornwall, which with St.Andrews remained her base. There she joined the Newlyn Society of Artists, the St.Ives Society of Artists and became a founder-member of the Penwith Society in 1949. She had known Margaret Mellis in Edinburgh and now became friends with Ben Nicholson, Barbara Hepworth and Naum Gabo.

A key influence was a visit to Switzerland in 1948 where she fell in love with glaciers as a subject, their transparency combined with their roughness. Took up an Italian government travelling scholarship in 1955 which produced another impressive body of work emphasising her incisive draughtsmanship. Taught at Leeds School of Art, 1956-7, and from 1961-3 had studio in London before returning to St.Ives.

At an early age she had drawn abstracts in coloured chalks, and during the 1960s and 1970s Barns-Graham’s work became more conceptually abstract. She exhibited At Downing’s Bookshop, St.Ives, in a solo show in 1947 and 1949 and showed steadily after that, selected venues being Roland, Browse and Delbanco; Richard Demarco Gallery, Edinburgh; New Art Centre; and Pier Arts Centre, Stromness. The first major retrospective of her work was organised at Newlyn Art Gallery, 1989-90 and touring. Arts Council and Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art hold her work.