Page 14 - 9781909825086_interior_cover.indd
P. 14
Bruce Williams
Born 1951
Lives and works in St Leonards on Sea, UK
www.saatchionline.com/brucewilliams
Bruce Williams is a fi gurative, expressionist
painter who is constantly at odds with
creating the pictorial image. Primarily
interested in the artistic process as a
learning experience, he uses large sash
brushes to create bold paintings with an
intensity and depth that can surprise both
the onlooker and artist. A wide range
of subjects are explored that ultimately
invite the viewer to move in and out of the
artwork in search of shape and salience
amidst complex ambiguity.
Infl uenced by artist’s such as Kossoff, Bacon
and Chaim Soutine, Williams constantly
scrapes back the painting in a chaotic
free reign of risk and chance, sometimes
involving a change of medium, in an
anxious search for truth, value, and matter
of fact. The paintings acquire layers of
‘skin’ in a long process that fi nally gains
more structure as Williams stretches
the materiality of the paint, pushing on
through to arrive at an intricate and
intense point of aesthetic communication.
Williams comments:
“It is like the struggle with faith, something
we can’t see or touch yet nevertheless
sense is there.”
Williams paints a diverse range of everyday
objects such as a child’s swing, a ladder,
a chicken brought home unplucked from
the market, two garden bins, a self-portrait.
He does not see himself as an abstract
artist, but rather as a part traditional, part
contemporary, fi gurative, expressionist
painter. His paintings subject matter is
directly confronted in a process to either
create, or locate and uncover, some
special aspect that allows it to be seen in a
new and exciting way.
BRUCE WILLIAMS has participated in a number
of group and solo shows across the South East of
England, both in Hastings and London.
Right: Flowers in Orange Pot, 2011, Oil on Canvas.
h: 102cm w: 76cm d: 4cm, Artist’s Collection.
Left: Reclining Man, 2011, Oil on Canvas.
h: 151cm w: 151cm d: 4cm, Artist’s Collection.
14 15