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Picture: Alex Statters

Jean Batten - 1938. Aviator.

A collection of portraits by an amateur artist who sent his paintings to famous subjects for them to sign has been unearthed. Self-taught Alex Statters spent nearly 40 years at his hobby, painting the great and important figures from photographs then trying to get them signed. The painter often had to wait as long as a year to get a reply. Statters was born in the early 1890s and after a working life in Newcastle settled in Southport, Merseyside. It is thought he died in the early 1960s. The collection has passed down through his family to his grandchildren who until recently were only aware of a few of the portraits that were hung in the family home.