Valerie Thornton studied at the Byam Shaw School of Drawing and Painting and at Regent Street Polytechnic in London. In 1966 she married Michael Chase, then the Resident Curator at the Minories Art Gallery, and set up a printmaking workshop there. They moved to Suffolk in 1974. Her etchings were frequently inspired by medieval sculpture and architecture. The Tate Gallery houses many of her prints as does the UK Government Art Collection. She made 260 prints which are admired world-wide

Right: photograph of Thornton in her studio