(b Invercargill, 18 May 1920; d Auckland, 12 Oct 1979). New Zealand sculptor. She studied at the Canterbury School of Art (1938–40), where the guidance of Francis Shurrock (1887–1977) encouraged her to take up sculpture. Her principal subjects were human figures, heads and animals in attitudes of stillness and repose. Among her early works in wood are Head (1948; Auckland, Haydn priv. col., see 1982 exh. cat., no. 8), which depicts a Maori woman, and Mask (1948–50; Auckland, Haydn priv. col., see 1982 exh. cat., no. 16), which is influenced by Pacific carving. In 1952 Macalister’s work was the New Zealand entry in a competition organized by the Institute of Contemporary Arts in London for a statue of the Unknown Political Prisoner (unexecuted). Her maquette, in concrete, was exhibited at the Tate Gallery, London, in 1953. The scale of her work increased after 1957, when she began working in cast and moulded concrete. Her principal European influences were Henry Moore and Marino Marini, but a Pacific and Maori awareness is always evident. An exhibition of new work in concrete, with two other sculptors, Alison Duff (b 1914) and Ann Severs (b 1931), at the Auckland City Art Gallery in 1959 was acclaimed as a landmark in New Zealand sculpture. She received a number of large public commissions, including a monumental bronze Maori Figure (1964–6; Auckland, Queen Street; for illustration see NEW ZEALAND, fig. 8).