Charles Blackman first encountered Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland (1865) and its sequel Through the Looking-Glass, and What Alice Found There (1872) through his wife Barbara, a writer and poet whose progressive blindness led her to listen to recordings of the stories read by BBC announcer Robin Holmes. Inspired by the visual imagery produced by Carroll’s whimsical wordplay (rather than the book’s famous illustrations by John Tenniel, which the artist had not seen), Blackman began to draw parallels between Alice’s nonsensical and unpredictable encounters and the real-world challenges he and his wife faced as a young couple. In addition to Barbara’s failing eyesight, an impending baby and changes in their financial circumstances influenced the development of Blackman’s series of 41 paintings. The Blue Alice 1956 sees Alice (Barbara) and the White Rabbit (Blackman) being wed by the story’s Dormouse; across the series, the integration of the Blackmans’ personal experiences with those of Alice offers a whimsical transformation of the tale from fiction to reality.