Daughter of an ordinary Army family, Dame Elisabeth Frink grew up to be an original, passionate and exceptionally talented sculptor, one of the few 20th-century artists to achieve critical acclaim while remaining popular with the general public. From ordinary beginnings, Frink went on to take her place at the centre of Bohemian Chelsea; she married three times, had many lovers, and became friends with many of the late 20th century's most colourful figures from the art and literary worlds. A complex, contradictory figure of great inner strength and integrity, Frink embodied a peculiarly eccentric mixture of flamboyance and conventionality. Gardiner's biography focuses on the places (Suffolk, London, France and Dorset) and people (lovers, husbands, friends) that shaped her life and on the themes (men, horses, birds) and beliefs which shaped her work readily enmeshing the two.