My wife, Sue Pritchard, who has died aged 71, was the founding force behind Dorchester Arts Centre in Dorset and the first arts in hospital coordinator at Dorset County hospital. She was not only inexhaustibly creative but also someone whose entrepreneurial vision helped the creativity of others to flourish. In Dorset she championed access to the arts in a county that was sometimes slower than others to embrace its enriching potential.
Sue was born in Brentwood, Essex, to Jack Dexter, a chartered secretary, and his wife, Joan (nee Ross). She went to Reigate County school for girls in Surrey and, following an English degree at the University of Reading, moved with her first husband, Nick Pritchard, to south Wales, where they worked as tenant farmers. There she spun wool from her sheep and wove cloth on her loom.
She and Nick moved with their two young daughters to a derelict cottage in Dorchester in 1979, renovating it entirely. After training to be a teacher at the Dorset Institute for Higher Education, Sue taught at the tiny village schools in Abbotsbury and Portesham and she and Nick became a fostering family, eventually adopting one of their fostered boys, Leon. She and Nick divorced in 1989.
Having started, with other teachers, to run drama and music workshops at an empty primary school in Dorchester, Sue seized the opportunity to promote professional performances and exhibitions there. From 1985 to 1990 she worked tirelessly to establish the inaugural Dorchester Arts Centre in the old school building, serving as its first director, securing funding and skilfully managing a large team of volunteers and patrons. Her ambitions were broad: she brought into Dorset for the first time such theatre companies as Kneehigh and Told by an Idiot, and such music groups as Oysterband and Show of Hands. She also initiated a rural outreach programme to take professional work across Dorset.
From 1990 Sue taught students at Weymouth College about arts management, the place of the arts in society, and costume design. She costumed 30 student productions over 10 years, as well as professional shows, and was simultaneously appointed as the first arts in hospitals coordinator at the new Dorset County hospital, overseeing commissions and installations and persuading all and sundry that the arts have a powerful part to play in promoting the all-round health of patients. Elisabeth Frink’s bronze dog and Peter Logan’s kinaesthetic pencil sculpture remain iconic features of the hospital’s environment.
Although textile and costume remained her primary artistic passion, Sue loved plants and gardens and later trained as a florist. Arthritis in her hands curtailed this last career, but her house was always full of fresh flowers, beautifully arranged.
We met when I was volunteering at Dorchester Arts Centre, and we married in 1990. She is survived by me, her two daughters from her first marriage, Kate and Faith, her son, Leon, my daughter, Jessica, and three grandchildren, Madeleine, Jonty and Imogen.
