PALSER, Alice

1938 - 2015

As Cecily Alice Luck, she was born at Kitalein, Kenya on 10 November 1938. Educated at Loreto Convent Msongari, Nairobi and in 1957 travelled to England to study at Hornsey College of Art, her fees and allowances covered by an Aunt Gilly, one of her mother's two sisters who was a head teacher and full of encouragement. After five years at Hornsey, she entered the Slade School of Fine Art. She married in 1959, Richard C. W. Palser (born 1938), whom she met at Hornsey College, from when she worked under the name of Alice Palser. Half-way through Alice's art course her son Richard was born in 1963 but she completed the course. From Slade she went on to teach at a secondary school in Victoria, London and then at a grammar school in Hertfordshire but took a year off to have her daughter, Elissa Eva Palser in 1967 but proceeded as a teacher in junior schools. Alice then took a position in charge of the art department at a new school in Hertfordshire where there was a space for clay work, and where she took up the teaching of pottery, taking a teacher-training course in pottery in London. Alice began selling her creations at Hemel Hempstead market and had an exhibition at the arts centre in Hemel Hempstead Town Hall. Having separated from her husband, in 1982 she came to Suffolk and purchased 1 Mill Cottage, The Hills, Uggeshall near Beccles and built a studio in the garden. About 1984, Alice was one of the founders of Craftco, a shop and gallery in Southwold High Street, run as a co-operative by craftspeople to exhibit and sell their work. About 2004 she moved to 1 Loampit Lane, Halesworth, Suffolk. Alice took her art inspiration from her childhood upbringing in Africa and the art and mythology from around the world and the nature surrounding her Halesworth home. Alice Palser created figurative sculpture in the form of free-standing figures, wall mounted faces and fountains, created in clay and then cast in resin, these sculptures are individually finished in bronze, iron, and natural finishes. Alice also created a range of individual watercolours and oil paintings and has exhibited widely in the U.K and Europe. Alice moved to Wales, sharing a home with daughter Elissa Palser, with a studio in a converted barn. Cecily Alice Palser died in Wales on 16 February 2015 and a memorial exhibition was held at The Cut Halesworth on 20 July 2015.

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Works by This Artist