Helga Prosser

"Swirl"
stainless steel
c.20cm high
"Pierot"
ceramic
14cm high
"Juggler"
painted steel
c.18cm high

(1=artist's collection, 2&3=in private collections)

Helga Prosser was born in 1932 in South Africa. She studied Fine Art in 1950/53 at the University of Cape Town and in 1959 at the Central School of Art in London. She has lived in Wales since 1961, except for a period in the 1970s when she taught sculpture at Ahmadu Bello University in Nigeria; influences: Lippy Lipshitz & Leslie Thornton

Artist's Statement: "I obtained a B.A.(Fine Arts) degree from the Michaelis School of Fine Art at the University of Cape Town, where I studied under Lippy Lipshitz.

In Britain since 1959, I studied welding & bronze casting at the Central School of Art in London with Leslie Thornton & became fascinated with possibilities of welded sculpture. It was an inexpensive means of working directly without having to consider the difficulties of casting complex shapes & more importantly large shapes or figures could fly through the air balanced on a single point. Space could not only penetrate shape, but also be under it. The strength of the steel could overcome other limitations of more traditional materials being able to be large, tough & movable.

These qualities coincided with my growing interests in moving human figures---the vigorous strivings of football & rugby players, and the human relationship expressed in the movemnt of the ballet, could be built up and frozen into gestures in this strong, but flexible material. I particularly like its uncompromising hard shiny quality which forces one to pare ideas down to essentials." (quoted, by kind permission of the artist, from a leaflet to the exhibition at the Washington Gallery, Penarth in Feb./March 2002.)

Awards: 1952 the South African Michaelis Prize

Commissions: 1956 a 17' architectural feature of cement in SA; 1958 two yellow-wood carvings for St.Josephs in SA; 1966 footballers in steel for Cwmbran New Town; 1967 a 7' garden sculpture in steel; 1980 Crucifix in steel for Michaelston-y-Fedw; 1991 a 6' leap frog in steel for the Ebbw Vale Garden Festival; 1997 Battle of Camlan in steel for Ffwrmm; 2004 the crown for the National Eisteddfod in Newport.

International Links:
collections abroad=in art galleries in South Africa.
exhibitions abroad=numerous exhibitions in South Africa.