Avril Vellacott is known by many appreciative students as a talented teacher of sculpture at Richmond Adult Education College.
She trained at the City and Guilds of London School of art taking the Sculpture Prize for her year Kingston School of Art and Sir John Cass College.
She has worked as a sculptor for many years mostly in the field of figurative and portrait sculpture with occasional essays into abstract forms of painting. The core of her work is a series of terracotta portraits ranging from new-born babies through maturity to the experience and serenity of old age. In the absence of an easily available body of knowledge on the subject of terracotta she has evolved her own techniques. She also works in plaster, paper and wood. Avril has made “special effects” for the film “The Never Ending Story” for Bavaria Films in Munich, Germany and work for Pinewood Studios. Before coming to Richmond her teaching experience involved many years in North Devon Education, The Somerset College of Art and at Sunbury Adult Education and has exhibited at the Royal West of England, Dartington Hall and the Society of Portrait Sculptors at the Mall Galleries.
Avril has undertaken many private commissions in portrait and sculpture but the most notable of these are:

• The Marquess of Bath
• Noel Coward
• Samuel Beckett
• The Earl Haigh
• Henry Williamson
• Jeremy Thorpe (This bust was unveiled in the House of Commons in 2009.)