Ann Timmerman was born in Alabama. Her love of art and her love of dolls were encouraged by her mother, who was an artist herself and created beautiful landscape paintings. Ann graduated from college with a major in Fine Art, raised her two children and worked as an art director for an advertising agency. It was only after deciding to give her dollmaking a chance as her second career that she was able to rekindle her passion for dolls. In 1992, she completed her first original sculpted porcelain doll. Since then, she has become well known among doll collectors. She has worked with almost every major doll company, and has sculpted a total of 52 dolls in ten years. She has been nominated for 26 awards, and she has won 2 Doll of the Year awards and 4 Awards of Excellence.
All the dolls made by Ann Timmerman have a particular beauty and often a strong sense of nostalgia. The artist explains, "I think they must reflect my Southern heritage." Her soft sweet accent hints of the Alabama towns in which Ann spent her childhood. "My father was a minister and my mother was a schoolteacher. I grew up as a child who loved dolls more than almost anything else. I made them, too, out of everything and anything I could find. I also drew a lot and always my subject was children. I read a lot, too- fairy tales and myths- and I suppose those all affected my feelings about childhood and dolls and helped give me a more idealistic view of the world."
Ann says that when she thinks back on those days now, "My childhood seems to me a lot slower paced than my adult life has been! I feel I haven't had as much time with my children as my parents did with me." "You know," she adds, "I always felt that I was born a couple of generations too late. I guess that is why my dolls sometimes seem to remind people of a slower, more romantic and gentle time; A sweeter time, really, than anything we know now."
Doll lovers can expect to continue to see many new and appealing dolls form the hands of Ann Timmerman. She was born with a gift and has been blessed to be able to share it with others who love dolls as much as she does.