Drawing and painting are essential ingredients of the Ingham persona, but for many years they served only as a background to other interests. At 13, Alan left his native Yorkshire to join the Navy via the RN college at Dartmouth, England. In due course ha specialised in hydrographic surveying - chartmaking - taking him around the world but offering little chance of a family life. It gave him the hand of a cartographer and the eye of a surveyor, and a yearning for his native land that determined the course his life would eventually take. In his thirties he left the Navy to pass on his surveying expertise to students in the emerging offshore oil and gas industries. After writing two text books for his course, Alan turned again to painting in his spare time. By the end of the 1970''s his watercolours were reproduced widely on greeting cards and calendars and exhibitions of his originals became regular events. 1984 was a cardinal year for Alan. He settled with his wife, Rose, in Gloucestershire, England and became a full-time artist. At last he was in his element. Trips to gather material for future subjects alternated with periods in his studio. The old Surveyors'' motto: "No day too long, no work too arduous" held true as ever, but now with an intense sense of pleasure and contentment. His originals - by now numbering over 1200 - are to be found in private and corporate collections the world over. In 1996 Alan''s book "Under a Watercolour Sky" was published. Subsequently his limited editions have proved even more popular, notably his "geographical portfolios" celebrating the character of regions of the British Isles.