Alison Elizabeth Baker
Alison Elizabeth Baker
Born: Bulawayo, Zimbabwe 17th April 1956
Born & educated in Bulawayo, Alison cannot remember a time when she did not
draw, paint, and ride horses. She grew up surrounded by artists, ‘working’ in studios,
being taken around the art galleries of Europe and exploring the magnificent cave
paintings (and rock formations) of the Matopos. Apart from this influence, from early
primary school she had a rigorous grounding in life drawing with Alec Lambeth at
Bulawayo School of Art. Training at a formative age which she considers invaluable.
She was educated in Bulawayo. Forbidden to attend art school – her father already
had one daughter “suffering for her Art on his income”– she graduated from the
University of Cape Town, reading History and History of Art. She went on to further
post graduate qualifications in the UK.
She worked in a variety of areas: including Zimbabwe Parks and Wildlife Authority,
teaching art at Secondary School and as Exhibitions Designer at the National Gallery
of Zimbabwe. Now based in Victoria Falls, she lives, paints and works as a game
ranger in charge of her own anti-poaching unit, patrolling daily through wildlife
areas.
Her work is an expression of this – the suffering, mans’ culpability, the fragility and
resilience of the environment, the planet. She incorporates site specific mud, sand
shell and bone as an intrinsic part of the statement. She attempts to understand this
in the context of histories: destruction, reconstruction, resilience and decay. The
planets survival in mutable forms despite us.
She lives her work.
She has participated in group exhibitions over the years, most recently in:
2017-2019: Women Artists Annual exhibition at the National Gallery of Zimbabwe,
Harare
2017, 2018: National Annual Exhibition at the National Gallery of Zimbabwe, Harare
2018 The National Gallery of Bulawayo 3rd Annual Independence Exhibition:
LEGACY
UN - IDPWD The Future is Accessible at the National Gallery of Zimbabwe, Harare
2019 Rembrandt @350 at the National Gallery of Zimbabwe, Harare and at the
National Gallery of Bulawayo
2022-2023: “A Book That Cannot be Read”: solo exhibition at the National Gallery of
Zimbabwe, Harare: November 2022 through to running
Curated by Fadzai Muchena
Awards: A Book That Cannot be Read: curated by Fadzai Muchena, won NAMA Arts
Award Exhibition of the Year 2023. Great work by Fadzai
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