Jane Alexander was born in Johannesburg in 1959. From a very young age she started showing great artistic talent, and is now one of South Africa's most acknowledged sculptors. She studied at the University of Witwatersrand and obtained a Bachelor of Arts in Fine Art degree in 1982. That same year, she was the winner of the National Fine Arts Student Competition as well as the Martienssen Student Prize. In 1988 she completed her Masters in Fine Art. She had initially started her degree majoring in painting, but eventually changed to sculpture as she found it much more appealing and realized that she was more suited to it. At university, Alexander was exposed to information about the political situation in South Africa through students' underground organizations and activities, and this contributed greatly to her work.
When growing up in the suburbs, Alexander had been shielded from everyday police- and street violence. …
