A painter and printmaker, Frances Walker studied at Edinburgh College of Art. She was sole teacher of art in Harris and North Uist in the Outer Hebrides before taking up a position as Lecturer in Drawing and Painting at Gray’s School of Art, Aberdeen. She was also a founding member of Peacock Printmakers, Aberdeen.

Walker's experience of teaching art in the Hebrides led to a life-long love of wild and desolate places. Since then, she has chosen to depict the most remote landscapes and her compositions are usually based on coastal reaches, craggy rocks and deserted beaches. Walker divides her time between Aberdeen and the Western Isles, especially Tiree, where she owns a thatched cottage.  More recently she has also travelled further afield; her latest inspiration being the even wilder and more desolate landscapes of Iceland and Antarctica.​