After selling art for a quarter of a century at Heritage House, Anna Cann decided to create something of her own.

And now Ms Cann will have her debut show tonight at the Bermuda Society of Arts (BSoA) with her collection of paintings and jewellery entitled 'Anna's Celebration'.

Her medium is mainly acrylic, but she also uses oils and pastels and her inspiration is all about Bermuda's buildings and waterscapes.

"I drive around and I take pictures," said Ms Cann who particularly loves painting St. George's.

A seamstress by trade, who then spent 25 years working in an art gallery, she never once thought of creating her own work. "I just admired people's art," she said. "I just always liked art, I never wanted to become an artist myself."

After her mother passed, she decided to try her hand at something new, so she took her first class in 2001 with artist Sharon Wilson. "She is fantastic and I had a great start in learning how to draw," said Ms Cann.

"It was just that I didn't like the pastels and charcoals, and getting all mucky, but she was an excellent teacher. I tried watercolours, but I just couldn't handle them, because you have to wait for them to dry and I want to finish it in a flash.

"And then I went to Edwin Smith and he taught acrylics, charcoals and drawing, so I think he was a great teacher too. All of them had a lot of patience."

Ms Cann is currently taking lessons with the artist Manuel Palacio who is teaching with Community Education. "I've been wanting to go to him, but I've always been away and only been able to get in one or two [of his] classes," she said. "I'm enjoying that."

Since beginning to paint, she has won a second and a third prize at the Butterfield Bank's Art Festival at Masterworks in 2005 and 2006.

She has also turned a small bedroom in her house into her studio. "I gave my granddaughter the bed and I put up my easel and desk, and now it is filled with art," she said.

The show also culminates on a very special day for her. "June the 11 is my birthday and I have a friend from Chicago flying in for my show."

Ms Cann has also begun making jewellery and will have a selection in the show, but as for having a show it wasn't her idea.

"I don't think that I would have ever done it on my own, but they asked me at City Hall [BSoA], 'why don't you have a show?' So I asked 'me?' And they said, 'yes you, your work sells up here'.

Ms Cann says her new lease on life is all about having no stress. "I can do it when I want to and when I don't feel like it, I don't have to," she said.

"And if I have been busy and I think I haven't done any art today, I'll go in and when I look it is midnight and I think, 'get in your bed girl!'

"You know you get so carried away just seeing it come together."

For retirees who say they are going to sit around and just do nothing, Mrs. Cann says: "There are not enough hours in the day. I'm just busy."