Charles Williams

PRESIDENT

ELECTED ARWS 2007 & RWS 2010

Charles Williams  is a painter and writer. He exhibits his work in London, Europe and the USA, and has published ‘Basic Drawing: How To Draw What You See’ in September 2011 and the follow-up, ‘Basic Watercolour’ in July 2014 (Robert Hale, London).  Mainly a painter, he works in oil, watercolour, bronze, ceramics and graphic mediums, and his interests are in the figurative, narrative tradition, although the work is informed by a fascination with formal elements of 2D and 3D design. 

He writes fiction and is also a founder member of the Stuckist movement. Exhibitions include RA Summer Exhibition, Hunting Prize, Lynn Painter Stainers, Threadneedle Prize, The Marmite Prize, and Discerning Eye, and commercial galleries including Lily Zeligmann Gallery in the Netherlands, John Martin of London, Charlie Dutton Gallery, and solo shows at, among others, Thompsons of London, and the Bakersfield Museum of Modern Art, Cal., USA. 

 'I paint, rather than take photos, because painting allows me to improvise. My studio is a place for me to run with ideas and follow undefined feelings toward some kind of definition. I cannot really say what that is, other than a sense of recognition. 

 So, my chief studio rule is no sketches, no photos, no studies, nothing. People seem to assume that the paintings come from somewhere, but I promise you, they are simply a la tete. I cannot be bothered with stopping and fiddling around with other things, looking at photos, or doing that projecting thing. How boring can you get! It seems to me that the artist's life is so painful, dull and unremunerative,  you have to have somewhere that you are free to invent, to play, to experience, and of all places, shouldn't it be the studio?'

charleswilliamsartist.com