Maud Sherwood was born in Dunedin, although she moved to Wellington as a child and began her art studies at the Wellington Technical College with Mabel Hill and Mary Elizabeth Tripe. It seems Nairn had the most impact on her and in 1904 Sherwood took over his still life and sketching classes at the College where she stayed for nine years.

Exhibiting regularly with the New Zealand Academy of Fine Arts from 1898 onwards, Sherwood had her first solo exhibition at the McGregor Wright Art Gallery, Wellington, on 16 April 1910. In late 1911 she left New Zealand and after a brief stay in London went to Paris where she visited artists' studios with Frances Hodgkins.

She then studied at the Académie Colarossi, one of the best-known art schools in Paris, where Frances had taught, and soon after moved to Percyval Tudor-Hart's studio. In the summer of 1912, she toured southern England in a sketching group organised by Tudor-Hart which included fellow expatriates Owen Merton, Cora Wilding and C.Y. Fell.

The following summer Sherwood visited the small fishing port and artist mecca of Concarneau, Brittany. It may well have been recommended to her by Hodgkins, who had spent the summer of 1911 painting in the picturesque fishing village. Whilst staying there Sherwood also met Cantabrian expatriate Sydney Lough Thompson, who was resident in Concarneau during this period.

Sherwood left Europe in 1913 settling in Sydney, and by 1914 she had begun exhibiting with the Society of Artists and had two paintings purchased by the New South Wales Art Gallery. In 1924 she was elected the only woman member of the Committee of the Watercolour Institute in Sydney.

In 1925 she visited New Zealand for 14 months before again travelling to Europe where she remained until 1933. She exhibited several times in Paris, Rome and London and on her return to Sydney exhibited watercolours and drawings, although in the 1940's her work expanded to include colour linocuts.