Glasgow born Alison Bell studied at both Glasgow School of Art and the University of Glasgow. Her main training in sculpture came from her time spent at Glasgow Sculpture Studios in the Nineties. There, she learned traditional techniques alongside established artists before being elected to the Royal British Society of Sculptors in 1997.
Alison states that she aspires to make work that touches the free spirit in all of us, mainly through memories of childhood. She is drawn to the formative years of our lives when imagination was the most powerful thing. Scaling fortresses and standing on ramparts as the kings and queens of our own invented worlds.
Alison’s work is essentially figurative and rooted in her early practice as a portrait sculptor. While the truth of the memory is important to her, the main aim is evoking a particular moment in time. In order to do this she works freely and quickly in wax, observing and remembering before refining each piece in order for it to be cast in bronze.
