Artist born in London who prefers to be known by his surname only. He studied at St Martin’s School of Art, graduated in 1950 and in the same year had his first solo exhibition, solely of paintings, at the Artists’ House, London. He continued to devote himself to painting for about the 20 years; from the early 1970s, he concentrated on sculpture and holograms, returning to painting only in 1989. Throughout these years he divided his time between Britain and Australia, exhibiting widely. A notable exhibition of his sculptures was staged at the Festival of Perth, Western Australia, in 1982, when five monumental sculptures were sited around the Festival’s theatres and 42 smaller ones were shown in the city’s Lister Gallery, one of the five larger sculptures, Pallisandro, marble, subsequently being purchased by the University of Western Australia. Alexander’s principal sculptural commissions are: Jubilee Oracle, bronze, 1979–80, The Queen’s Walk, South Bank, London; The Great Tower, bronze, 1979–80, Empingham, Rutland Water; Duet in Marble, 1980–81, University Hospital, Nottingham; and Music Sculpture, 1986–87, stainless steel, made in collaboration with composer Moya Henderson, for Lane Cove National Park, Sydney, Australia. A touring retrospective exhibition of Alexander’s work was shown at the Museum of Contemporary Art, São Paolo, Brazil, and the National Museum of the Fine Arts, Santiago, Chile (both 1989), and at the Modern Museum of Art, Santa Ana, California (1990).
Bibliography: askART: Artist Biography and Facts – Alexander; D. Buckman, Artists in Britain since 1945 (2 vols: A–L, M–Z), Bristol, 2006; T. Cavanagh, Public Sculpture of Leicestershire and Rutland, Liverpool, 2000, pp. xi, 289–91, 352; T. Cavanagh, Public Sculpture of South London, Liverpool, 2007, pp. 81–82, 418–19; E. Lucie-Smith, Alexander, London, 1992; W.J. Strachan, Open Air Sculpture in Britain, London, 1984, pp. 43, 154, 155, 167, 168, 249.
Terry Cavanagh, 2007; revised October 2024