Helen MacAlister, born 1969

Helen MacAlister is an artist who was born in Edinburgh in 1969. She is an artist as well as a teacher. Her interest in painting began while studying at Stevenson College of Further Education from 1986 to 1987. From 1987 to 1991, she earned a first-class honours degree in fine art, sketching, and painting at Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art in Dundee.From 1991 to 1992, MacAlister studied printmaking and the Sorbonne at the Cité Internationale des Arts in Paris. In 1990, she received a Hospitalfield Fellowship. She received a scholarship to study Italian at Siena University in 1993, as well as the Rome Scholarship in Painting at the British School in Rome. She received a grant and residency at the MacDowell Colony in Peterborough, New Hampshire, from 1995 to 1996. In Rome MacAlister was assistant to the artist David Tremlett. MacAlister states that her main concern had been "with the uses and origins of imagery in communication". She attempted to convey the significance of time and place through imagery. Her work has been shown internationally. Helen MacAlister's exhibitions have included the Demarco Gallery in Edinburgh in 1989, the RSA in 1990, the Royal Glasgow Academy of Fine Arts in 1992, RSW in 1994, and Art First in 2002.