Diedie Marais grew up on a farm bordering the old Transkei and as a child was a self-taught artist. She went to Rhodes University and studied art under Walter Battiss & Alfred Ewan.

Diedie Marais is an extremely versatile artist. Though competent in many art media, she has a preference for the difficult one of watercolour, exploiting its crisp line in her tangled bush scenes and landscapes.

In 1978 Diedie Marais won a New Signatures Award in Pretoria. From working as a cartographer, she went into teaching art and was the head of the art department at St John’s College for over 20 years.

As a member of the Watercolour Society of SA, her work has often been seen on their selected exhibitions and she was awarded an Associateship and later Fellowship by the Society. Marais’s work is represented in a number of corporate and private collections here and in Europe and Australia.