Wilma Johnson is an artist, writer, and surfer. She was born in London in 1960 and has lived in Mexico, Ireland and now lives near Biarritz in the Basque country . She studied painting at St Martins College of Art, and while she was there set up the Neo Naturist performance art group with Christine and Jennifer Binnie and Grayson Perry.
In 1987 she went on holiday to Mexico and stayed for a year, painting in hotel rooms and drinking in cantinas with friends of Frida Kahlo. After that she moved to a remote fishing village in county Kerry, where she stayed for ten years, bringing up her three children in a rural idyll complete with vegetable garden, ducks and hens.
Then when she was 40 she decided to become a surfer, despite never having done any sport in her life. She moved to Biarritz where she split up with her husband, swapped a painting for a surfboard and headed out into the ocean.
Her first book, Surf Mama tells the story of the inspiring, if sometimes painful journey from surf widow to surf addict.
