My husband, Keith Hill, who has died aged 87, was an accomplished “outsider artist”, a self-taught sculptor in wood and stone whose work was shown in many galleries in the UK and abroad. He was also a community worker and local politician, an opera lover, a francophile and a flat-racing aficionado. Keith was a risk-taker. When he wanted to do something, he went ahead, and if it worked out, that was fine; and if it didn’t he might try something else.
Keith was born in Chingford, Essex, the son of Henry Hill, a policeman, and Gladys (nee Hunter), a housewife. He left secondary modern school in Walthamstow, east London, at 15.
After national service Keith spent a year in a Sheffield steel foundry as part of the industrial mission, and decided that he wanted to become a priest. He started his training at Brasted College, Kent, but left to marry his first wife, Jean, in 1958 and moved to London, where he worked as a youth and community organiser in Stepney and Blackfriars.
In 1960 he moved north to become warden of Manchester University Settlement, in Ancoats, providing community services such as playgroups, youth clubs, OAP luncheon clubs and advice centres. Keith became involved in local politics in Manchester, serving as a Labour city councillor from his first election in 1962 until 1968 and standing as Labour parliamentary candidate for Knutsford in the 1964 general election. Keith and Jean divorced in 1968.
He moved to Oxford in 1974 to become a principal officer for community development for Oxfordshire county social services department, where he met me. We married in 1980. Around this time he began making sculptures, creating groups of people, especially choirs, circuses and orchestras. It became a passion, and in 1998 he gave up his job to become an artist full time.
In 1996 he had works accepted by the Royal Academy in London and by the Royal West of England summer shows. His sculptures have been shown in galleries in the UK and France and pieces are held in private collections in Europe, the US and Japan. He was a member of Oxford Art Society from 1991 and chair from 2003 to 2007.
A confirmed francophile, Keith moved to Argouges in Normandy in 1997 where he worked as an artist for three years before returning to his studio in the Abbey at Sutton Courtenay. He was a generous host, delighting in serving up delicious meals for fellow artists and activists or providing picnics for his other passion of horse racing.
Keith is survived by our children, Beth and Oliver, and me; by Duncan and Louise, the children from his first marriage, and by eight grandchildren.
