Ian White Williams

Ian White Williams is an artist from Philadelphia. He came to my attention when I saw some posts  on Facebook about his curated show PAIR: FORTY PAINTINGS, TWENTY PAINTERS at Proto Gallery. I love the concept and plan to see the show as it is up until February in Hobken, NJ. 

Here is his statement on the show;

As a painter I am always excited about what happens in the studio when two paintings, conceived of and executed separately, find their way into proximate space.  When paintings are paired their elements may alternately resonate and contrast, amplifying both the individuality and the continuity of the work.  It is a process of exploration that often does not make its way outside of the studio.  When I was invited to curate a show at Proto Gallery I decided that I wanted to present other painters with the opportunity to discover and show pairings of their own work in the context of an exhibition.  I selected twenty painters whose work I admire greatly and asked them to choose a pair of paintings for this exhibition.  The results are surprising, provocative and diverse. 

I asked Ian to send me some images of his own work and write a few words about his influences which happen to be some of the artists in his show.

Slight Drift

2013

Gouache on paper

7" x 5"

Statement:
Ian White Williams’s works are developed through an unfolding of responses. His process is one of action and reaction with the resulting meditations conveying the hum of the peripheral, the mundane and the under-considered, as he aims to capture the sensation of the intimate. The paintings are generated with a lightness and quickness of touch in a minimal process where the faintest influence or mark can tip the balance.

Sharps

2013

Marker and gouache on paper

9" x 5.5"

 Influences:

The question of influences is a good one, and one that I have had a bit of a complex about for quite some time. One of my clearest memories of applying to grad school was being interviewed by a panel of professors and current students at a certain program which will remain unnamed. Things were going well in the interview when someone asked which artists had the strongest influence on my work. I responded frankly, as I only could, and told them that I was most influenced by the work that I saw around me every day, the work of my fellow students at Tyler (where I was doing my undergrad), and even more so by the work of my closest friends. As soon as the words passed my lips I saw the blank disapproving stares of the panel, and knew then that I was not going to be offered the spot. At least that is how I remembered things going. My response may not have, in fact, sealed my fate, but it certainly didn't help. What is certain is that I have always felt insecure about the question of influence. As if I was constantly trying to be sure that I was liking the "right" artists, and that I was able to quickly and freely rattle off a list of artists that were both known, but not too well known. Edgy, but not the flavor of the month. I should never cite my best friend as artistic influence, but I also dare not admit to my love for Monet or the like. I offer this personal history of social anxiety simply to frame my response as I would present it now, older, no less anxious but strangely satisfied with the somewhat pedestrian reality of my limited art vocabulary and reference.

Brachiate

2013

Marker and gouache on polypropylene

6" x 4.5"

So here it goes. My biggest influences are... my friends. But in all seriousness, I currently am fortunate enough to work out of two studios, each of which I share with another painter. I have a studio in Philadelphia that I share with Tim Schwartz (whom I have been close friends with for almost 20 year) and a studio in Ambler, PA that I share with David T Miller (whom I work with everyday as a high school art teacher). The conversations we have about process and content and the paintings I watch them create, clearly have the most direct impact on me as an artist. Far greater than anything I have seen in a gallery or read in a book. Tim also served as my primary conduit into the language of painting as I transformed my practice away from sculpture a few years ago (my undergrad and graduate degrees are both in sculpture). Beyond my closest friends, Facebook has completely changed this notion of influence for me as well. To be able to so easily view the work of and communicate with artists from all over the world is truly revolutionary. It would be impossible to list all of the Facebook artists that have impacted me and my work but here is a brief playlist: Inga Dalrymple, Inge Decuypere, Lauren Collings, Michael Voss.

Lost From Looking

2013

Oil on Linen

12” x 17”

I do have influences in the traditional sense (i.e. artists beyond my reach either do to history, prestige, or otherwise). Among those Raoul DeKeyser probably leads the pack. But I also look at some Robert Motherwell, Helmut Federle, John Zurier, Edouard Vuillard, to name a few more.

Break In the Family

2013

Ink & gouache on polypropylene

6” x 5”

These are all words regarding the visual artists that influence my work. In truth, when I am actually painting these people and things could not be further from my mind. My actual influences vary from painting to painting and can include anything from a window latch, to a Circus Lupus song, to a shadow on my paper, to the void in my coffee cup.

Lets Me Be

2013

Gouache, ink and liquid graphite on fired clay

9.5" x 8.5"

On Titles: Tracey Adams

Tracey Adams says:

"My work is inspired by many years of music study and its organization. Words that reference intervals, counting, circular movement, and numbers grab my interest for titles of various series I've worked on over the last 20 years. Visually this translates as patterns and movement. Sometimes there is an obvious connection with the title, other times, it is more oblique."

Sometimes I use a title of a musical composition that visually conveys something musical as in the Lumenis series (Lumenis 23, encaustic, oil and collage on panel, 40x40, 2013). 

Grapheme (Grapheme 3, encaustic and oil on panel, 40x30, 2013) is the smallest unit in a written language and may or may not have any meaning. Many symbols qualify as language systems, including numerical digits.

Radix, (Radix 22, encaustic monotype, acrylic, cold wax on panel, 36x36, 2012) for example, references a numeral system. In this case, the connection is more oblique.

An older series, Revolution, (Revolution 3, encaustic and monoprint on 4 panels, 30x30, 2006) is a more obvious connection.

On Titles: Julia Schwartz

Julia Schwartz says 

For me, the title is often an integral part of the process of making a painting, and in those cases it works in a kind of associative-linking process: perhaps a phrase is repeated while I'm painting, or a song comes to me or I'm listening to a song and that title becomes the title.  I try not to name things head on, but somewhat elliptically (like the work itself).

Examples: Earlier this year, I was making paintings which I referred to as state-of-being paintings. I called one Dummkopf as a way to convey the experience of not thinking while painting, a not-thinking-painting, hence a Dumb-head:

Dummkopf, 2013 oil on board, 10x8 inches

I've also been working on another series of paintings and in that case they are not so much connected to specific states, but convey something like emotional "atmosphere." In that situation, I chose to number the works in a somewhat idiosyncratic way: 

1.9.31.11, 2013 oil on linen 20x16 inches

www.juliaschwartzart.com

Editor, artist interview series

Figure/Ground Communication™  

www.figureground.org

How do you title your paintings? Revisited with Karen Nielsen-Fried

One of my approaches to titles is inviting specific people into my studio.  An artist with insightful vision, Karen  Nielsen-Fried is one of my "go to peeps" for my own work.

Here is her take on titles:

One of the wondrous mysteries of painting, for me, is the not-knowing, the necessary journey without a map, the allowing of the unfolding and blossoming of inchoate ideas into the substance and content of the painting. As i work, words and phrases often play inside my head and intrude into my wordless process; they are phrases that arise as my conscious mind tries to make sense of the intuitive and nonverbal process. I sometime experience this as annoying and I refer to it as "Intrusive Title Syndrome". To quiet these interruptions I make lists of the titles as they occur to me. (I have more titles than i will ever have paintings to title). Sometimes a particular title that comes to me while working sticks for awhile and seems, indeed, to name the painting; to put into words the essence of what I am trying to get at with the painting. I put these "good" titles on pieces of tape and stick them to the back of the painting as i continue working. These titles most often change as the process continues, and sometimes when I finish a painting there are 4 or 5 pieces of tape on the back. Very often i will consider and reject them all and then I will sit and look at and commune with the painting, trying to gather it's spirit and convey it by means of a few words.

I am something of a word geek. I love reading dictionaries and thesaurus(es?), love listening to other languages being spoken, trying to hear patterns and bits of meaning. I am intrigued by the subtle nuanced meanings of words; I revere poets who can distill from and articulate with a few words and phrases some deeply-felt truth. And often it is words and phrases, lines of poetry, titles of books, snippets of conversation, that will fuel a painting. It is then my task-- through the process of painting-- to understand the hold these words have on me, and why they are of such import at that moment, why I am moved by them.  I want my titles to be this same kind of distillation of the essence of my paintings, while still allowing enough ambiguity for a viewer to be able to have their own experience of finding meaning in the work.

For All We Know

  Marginalia

 We Are Always Letting Go

How do you title your paintings? Revisited 2013

I was going through my blog the other day and found a post in 2009 about paintings and titles. I have decided to open up the conversation again. 

Here is artist Connie Goldman on her titles:

"My titles reflect my love of language. I like to learn about word derivations in particular.  I even took a couple of classes in college that were concerned with Latin and Greek influences in the English language.  If you peruse my journals there are some that consist mainly of lists of words, their definitions, and their derivations.  For awhile all my titles were reflective of both the content and the reductive nature of my work.  I used Latin bases such as "Concertare", "Metrum", "Loci", and "Reciprocus".
Since my work is almost always about the tension between stability and change, and since I find the meter and space in language and music to be fascinating I search the dictionary for words that are connected to these things.  I've used "Brook", "Treble", "eddy", and "Current" for bodies of work."  

Brook VI

Metrum

Phasis X

Treble V

Reciprocus

Lorrie Fredette

A few weeks ago I took a trip to see fellow artist and friend Lorrie Fredette's installation that was at the Garrison Art Center in Garrison, NY. Every time I see her installations I am struck by the dichotomy of her subject matter and the beauty of the work. The smell, the skin-like surface, the light, shadows and the various ways to view the work are continually intriguing. 

My installations and sculptures are inspired by environmental and medical news stories pulled from today's headlines as well as historical events. Source material so far has included the swine, avian and Spanish flu epidemics and the increased incidence of poison ivy with the growth of greenhouse gases. Once I've chosen an area of focus, I embark on a rigorous course of research and gather images, which I then alter, vet and reject through an elaborate system designed to completely subvert and distort any likeness to the original source. I am interested in this confluence of science and art, in methodology that thwarts my natural hand and in the contrast between "ugly" origins and sublime outcomes. The use of wax in its natural color as my primary medium is intentional -- the neutral palette emphasizes shape, the aroma can be intoxicating and the texture is one that invites touch -- all in support of my goal to lure viewers into an experience that they would certainly try to avoid had they encountered the original infection.

Implementation of Adaptation

Beeswax, tree resin, muslin, brass, nylon line, steel, wood

© 2013

6 feet 1 inches x 36 feet x 12 feet

suspended 40 inches above the floor

Exhibitions:

Garrison Art Center, Garrison, NY, IMPLEMENTATION OF ADAPTATION, curated by Carinda Swann, 2013

Painting the Light Within

                                           by John Thornton