At the end of last year I was lucky enough to be accepted for a place on the 2017 Defining Practice course at Newlyn School of Art. Hopefully recording aspects of my practice on this blog will play a useful part in developing my work over the coming months.

Choosing five artists to write about from the many who’ve inspired and influenced me wasn’t as difficult as I’d expected. From a starting point of identifying the major influences on the finished pieces I feel most happy with, I’ve been able to arrive at a deeper understanding of the ways in which my practice so far has been sustained by admiration and respect for the work of the following individuals. This post is dedicated to them, as well as to the many others I haven’t been able to include but whose generosity in sharing their work has encouraged my efforts along the way.

JOSEPH CORNELL  (1903 – 1972)

Cornell’s imaginative transformation of everyday things, his love of the past and his addiction to the thrill of the hunt are part of his appeal for me, and the sense of connection that I felt when I first read Deborah Solomon’s biography, ‘Utopia Parkway’, came from recognising a kindred spirit. I’m uncomfortably aware that the impossibility/undesirability of copying his pieces can’t be overstated, but as someone who’s relentlessly curious and who gathers ideas and materials together slowly from sometimes unexpected sources, I’m unwilling to turn away from the inspiration that he offers. I find it interesting to speculate on what Cornell would have done if he’d had access to the internet and the opportunity to create a website. He might well have found eBay a useful resource on a practical level as I do, but the magical atmosphere of his beloved city streets and the parks and cafes that he visited as part of his shopping excursions would be lacking, and overall I think he would have found life in the 21st Century distinctly uninspiring.

Click here and here for more information on the life and work of Joseph Cornell

A collection of material for a possible future project on Edward James. For more on this theme see also my ‘digital dossier’ on the poet Robert Stephen Hawker 

EDWIN SMITH  (1912 – 1971)

Edwin Smith’s photos of buildings, interiors and landscapes are haunting and atmospheric and I’m often struck by the way in which he composes foregrounds, which are something I’ve struggled with. In addition to a career as an internationally acclaimed photographer, Smith also drew, painted or engraved every day. Looking at his beautiful images leaves me feeling nourished and refreshed and makes me determined to work harder at my own pictures and to achieve better results.

Click here for more information on the life and work of Edwin Smith

Angela Williams, St Nectan’s, Welcombe, Devon, 2011

Angela Williams, Snowy Morning, St Gregory’s, Dawlish, 2010

ALICE FOX

Alice Fox is a textile artist who uses paper and found materials as well as cloth. She frequently works out of doors and her sensitivity to the particularities of her chosen places, combined with her scientific training as geographer, makes her an inspirational person for me. Reading about her residency at Spurn Head and looking at images of the work she produced there stimulated ideas that I’m still exploring today, and her contribution to The Sketchbook Project inspired me to create a similar book (see below). I’m deeply impressed by the generosity and thoroughness with which she has documented her creative processes over the past seven years and I highly recommend spending some time browsing her extensive website.

Click here to visit Alice Fox’s website and here to read her post on The Sketchbook Project

Angela Williams, experimental sketchbook : oak gall ink, india ink and collage, 2013

Angela Williams, experimental sketchbook: tea, soluble graphite and collage, 2013

ALISA GOLDEN

Before I discovered Alisa Golden’s books I purchased a number of other works on the same topic and ended up giving all of them to charity shops without ever having completed a single project. What discouraged me, apart from the complexity and mechanical-looking perfection of the examples illustrated, was the fact that few of the books in the photos included any original content. Discovering Alisa’s work has made it possible for me to begin to express myself in ways that match my own instincts. Her found poems, technical wizardry and thoughtful and precise instructions make her an inspiring role model and teacher. It’s sobering to reflect on how much I’ve been able to learn from her, and still hope to learn, especially as despite much searching I haven’t yet come across another bookbinder who operates the way she does.

Click here to find out more about the work of Alisa Golden

Angela Williams, eco printed books and fabric, 2013

Angela Williams, winged book with pockets, 2016

LEONARD COHEN  (1934 – 2016)

I’ve saved Leonard Cohen until last because the debt I owe him is almost impossible to express in words. I love his willingness to take risks; the range of his sympathies; his generosity; the physicality of his art; his grace under pressure; his refusal to settle for less than the best result; his commitment to beauty. Also his work ethic, his sense of humour and his seriousness. I was fifteen when his songs first started weaving themselves into the fabric of my life and they’ve been helping me to hold things together ever since. How do you measure the gratitude that comes from the simple fact of knowing that somewhere on the planet for all those years he was going about his business, being and doing, blackening pages, making art?

VARIATION
by Federico García Lorca

Beneath the bough of the echo
only air.

Beneath a stem of stars
only water.

Beneath a thicket of kisses
your mouth.

Click here for the home page of The Leonard Cohen Files website. Allan Showalter’s excellent Cohencentric: Leonard Cohen Considered is also well worth a visit.

IN CONCLUSION

Writing this post has drawn my attention to similarities between these five artists which weren’t immediately apparent to me before. All of them are hard-working individuals with a clear sense of purpose in regard to their art. Much of what they create carries with it an awareness of life’s fragility and, in some cases, a powerful sense of loss. They are makers and craftspeople rather than fine artists, and writing and photography tend to play an important part in their work. Surrealism crops up surprisingly frequently and Cohen’s comments on Lorca, which I discovered while I was writing this, have an unexpected echo in my own remarks above:

‘I was fifteen when I began to read Federico Garcia Lorca. His poems perhaps have had the greatest influence on my texts. He summoned up a world where I felt at home. His images were sensual and mysterious: “throw a fist full of ants to the sun.” I wanted to be able to write something like that as well.’

Although Joseph Cornell was never truly a member of any Surrealist group, Surrealism had a powerful influence on his work, and he too was an admirer of Lorca. Alisa Golden’s found poems utilise a well-known Surrealist technique and Alice Fox’s stitched acorns and sea shells have an offbeat strangeness about them. At their lyrical best, Surrealist methods of working offer us a way of seeking out the unexpected and operating beyond our accustomed limits. These are fruitful tactics for any artist to employ and I look forward to exploring them in my work over the coming months.

Note: The version of Federico García Lorca’s poem, ‘Variacion’, shown above, was translated from the Spanish by Angela Williams in 2008 and was originally posted in the Leonard Cohen Flickr Group

All text and images © Angela Williams 2017