Alison Bevan (nee Lloyd) graduated in History of Art from Nottingham University in 1986 and has since spent her entire career working in museums and art galleries.  In 2024 she stepped away from full-time leadership roles to concentrate on sharing her passion and knowledge with others as a freelance lecturer and consultant.
 

From 2013-2024, Alison was Director of the RWA (Royal West of England Academy) – Bristol’s original public art gallery, and Britain’s only regional Royal Academy of Art, whose Academicians have included Stanhope Forbes, Dame Laura Knight, Dod Procter and Vanessa Bell, and today include Sir Frank Bowling, Sir Peter Blake and Eileen Cooper.

At the start of her career, she spent 10 years at the Glynn Vivian Art Gallery in Swansea, as Exhibitions Officer and then Curator, before taking up the role of Director of Penlee House Gallery & Museum, Penzance (1999-2013). Here she became an acknowledged expert on the Newlyn, Lamorna and St Ives artists colonies (1880-1940), a subject on which has lectured in the UK, USA and France. She was awarded the British Empire Medal in the 2013 New Year’s Honours for services to Cultural Heritage in Cornwall.

She is an Arts Society Accredited lecturer; Chair of Bristol Museums Oversight Board; Fellow of the Museums Association; an Honorary Research Fellow of the University of Bristol, and was Chair of the South Western Federation of Museums and Galleries from 2009-12.