Alyson Hunter was
born in 1948 in Auckland, New Zealand, her parents having travelled from
Sydney, Australia, to set up the Auckland factory branch of James Stedman
Henderson. Alyson attended Elam Art School with her twin sister Alexis,
studying painting under Colin McCahon. She majored in cast sculpture.
In 1969 she travelled to London attending Chelsea College of Art and the
Royal College of Art, Kensington. Her photoetchings were bought by the
Victoria and Albert Museum and the British Council. With her partner Darcy
Lange she moved to the East End of London, where they made film and photographic
work, also travelling to Birmingham and Bradford, and Moron de la Frontera
in Andalucía, Spain.
Working at Islington Studios with Hugh Stoneman which editioned artist's
prints, they decided to marry in 1974. Islington Studios was used by 300
international printmakers and Alyson opened the Islington Graphics Gallery
on the same premises, to promote photography in printmaking. The business
later moved to Earlham street, Covent Garden.
Alyson bought North Corner, the Cornwall painting studio of Dod Proctor,
from the Proctor family and Cornwall has featured in her artwork and poetry
since the 1970s.
In 1979 she travelled throughout America with Adrian Frost, the eldest
son of Sir Terry Frost, and their daughter Amy was born in Auckland, New
Zealand in 1981. The family then moved to Sydney, Australia, where Alyson
exhibited at the Robin Gibson Gallery. Moving back to New York she became
Master Printer in Robert Blackwood's Printmaking Workshop, and then travelled
back to California as Visiting Professor in Drawing, teaching with Roland
Peterson and Wayne Thiebaud in 1983.
Alyson Hunter moved back to London where she made photoetchings of Camden
and Soho, until she gave up the process in 1996. She then had exhibitions
of photographs of Soho life, and her portraits are in the National Portrait
Gallery in London. These images of Harry Diamond, and other Bon Vivants,
actors , writers and publishers.
Films of actors reading her published poetry, 'The Painted Sailor' and
'Night
Bus' are on UTube. She lives in London and Penzance, Cornwall.