ARTISTS TALKING

The name Bedwyr Williams is becoming more and more familiar to a wide and diverse audience thanks to some recent high profile residencies, exhibitions and awards. It is to the artist’s credit that he does not seem to let this overly influence his work, which has its own very idiosyncratic take on the world.

Working mainly in performance, but accommodating photography, video, installation and sculpture, Williams places himself very much on the outside by adopting a set of bizarre personas such as the Grim Reaper, a windswept Welsh bard, a Lithuanian woodsman and perhaps most peculiarly becoming a rubber dinghy. That his oddball outsider characters have quickly become so popular, and also attracted international attention and prizes perhaps quells the myth that you have to water down your ideas for wide scale acclaim.

A brief history

Bedwyr Williams was born in St Asaph, North Wales in 1974 and was raised in Colwyn Bay. Following a BA in Fine Art from Central St Martins School of Art in 1997 he attended Ateliers, Arnhem, studying for the Dutch equivalent of a UK MA. After living in London, he took what was perhaps the most important decision in his career so far and returned to live and work in Caernarfon, North Wales in 2002.

Public recognition

Williams was growing a unique if slightly off centre reputation for shows in London when he was commissioned by Ffotogallery, Cardiff on behalf of the Arts Council of Wales to document the Year of the Artist in 2000. Williams was an unusual but brave choice to cover a project that places artists under one cosy coverall term, but he undertook it in his own inimitable fashion. Assuming the guise of a roving private detective he travelled Wales gathering evidence about some of the groups and individuals who benefited from the Arts Council of Wales Year of the Artist Wales project.

As with many of his subsequent projects, Williams’ approach revealed both a disdainful, often painfully humorous view of his surroundings, and also a curious love/hate fascination with them. This also rings true of his relationship to being an artist, and his nationality.

The resulting exhibition and book introduced Williams’ obscure sense of wonder, which up to this point had only been seen by a small but faithful few, to a much wider and influential audience, not only in Wales but on an international level as well. It was the very restrictions of the commissions that had allowed his disarming irreverence to take centre stage.

Roadshow

Back in North Wales, Williams co-founded Real Institute, a film and performance club that played to local audiences. His next significant move was becoming involved with Grizedale Arts, Cumbria, with whom he still has an ongoing relationship. He took part in their ‘Roadshow’ exhibition, setting up the puntastic Blanaeu Vista Social Club in a caravan.

His involvement with Grizedale has led to him showing as part of ‘Romantic Detachment’, which took place at PS1 in New York, Chapter in Cardiff and Q Arts in Derby. Viewers were treated to a performance of Williams playing the part of a dinghy, in full inflatable outfit. Part stand-up comedy, part lament, Williams tells the tale of his travels to a techno soundtrack.

Solo

His first solo exhibition followed at Chapter in 2004, where he left out the performance element and constructed a large-scale installation that filled the gallery. Consisting of snooker tables, pool cues and chalk, Tyranny of the Meek was a full size model train set and surrounding landscape. This referenced Williams’ experience of being a model enthusiast and his fear of the snooker club he had to pass through on his way to sessions at his local model club. Both ordinary and extraordinary, Williams’ dour melancholic humour was again at the forefront.

Paul Hamlyn Award

Williams was now exhibiting widely and gaining international attention. This hard work was rewarded by receiving the prestigious Paul Hamlyn Award for Visual Arts in 2004. The awards were set up in 1993 to provide direct support to individual artists at a key moment in their career. Since 1998 the awards have focused on visual artists in the UK or Ireland, with a strong emphasis on experiment, innovation and cross arts collaboration.

Artists are nominated by a rotating panel, often including previous winners, curators, gallerists and critics. From a short-list of about eighty, five artists are selected annually by a panel of judges, with each artist receiving £30,000, spread over three years. The artists are selected on the basis of “talent, promise and need, as well as achievement”¹. Williams, despite being a square peg in a round hole, certainly met those criteria.

Whilst obviously happy to be awarded cash, and the exposure it brings, Williams takes a slightly ambivalent position towards awards and residencies. For him, the main benefit it affords is time. It is this apparent ambivalence that allows Williams to distance himself from the hullabaloo of ‘winning’ a major arts prize. Whilst this could be perceived as arrogance, it could be just the confidence that he is getting paid for his job as an artist.

Whilst prizes such as the Paul Hamlyn Award are very beneficial, they should not be seen as the pinnacle of achievement. It could be said that they distort the role of the artist, which is after all just another profession.

¹www.phf.org.uk/pressAIANov05.htm

Due credit

As with many artists, Williams mentions the need for time. Prizes such as the Paul Hamlyn Award are structured so you are paid for time for research, experiment or sometimes just the noodling about in the studio or on the computer that you need as an artist.

Williams’ approach to making art is unusually workmanlike given the end product. “I usually make work to answer a brief or because I’ve been offered a show. It’s quite nice then, because your work is a solution to an empty space or a dull private view. I choose whatever medium is correct for the job.”

Obviously the exposure prizes bring is a great boost for your career, with the accompanying press and PR scramble that goes with it. This opens up more opportunities for Williams to respond to. Whilst there is an added pressure to live up to expectations, Williams was already in a perfect position to diffuse it, with his work already full of sarcastic commentary on his daily life and being able to retreat to North Wales. From there he can let the art world – or “scary people with strange shoes and spectacles” as he describes them – get on with it.

International acclaim

Williams’ rise continued when he was awarded the first Artist-in-Residence for Wales at the Venice Biennale 2005. Williams spent six months on and off in Venice, producing a book of his observations of being an outsider in a city full of other outsiders. Whilst perhaps not the happiest time, Williams’ honest approach, once again full of sardonic wit, seemed to question the role of an artist in such a position. Whilst full of references to Venetian history and folklore, it seemed more about a desire to return home to Colwyn Bay – a brave and honest move given the high profile the residency afforded him. The resulting book and exhibition seemed to say: “You can’t be good all the time; I’m responding to this place and I just don’t like it here – get me home.” This honesty is refreshing, especially when it breaks out of the parameters of arts funding, prizes and residencies.

Future

Williams sees North Wales as a very productive place to live and work in terms of inspiration. He writes for Welsh TV, and doesn’t see many artists on a day-to-day basis. This seems to suit Williams down to the ground, perhaps seeing being an artist as a rather embarrassing occupation. There is also a disdain of the Welsh obsession with music and sport. All this adds up to his own peculiar brand of performance that refuses to meet anybody’s expectations of art except his own.

Whilst these restrictions, along with those of arts funding could be seen as negative, Williams turns them on their head, making something rather unique in the process.

With his recent first solo show in London and residencies in Toronto in 2006, others seem to agree, allowing Williams the chance to create new characters and pass judgement on the current state of affairs. It seems that being selfishly, if humorously obtuse is a creatively rewarding strategy. Isn’t that what all artists should be?

Contacts

Creative Wales Award
www.artswales.org.uk/creativewales

Grizedale Arts
www.grizedale.org

Wales at the Venice Biennale
www.walesvenicebiennale.org

Store (gallery showing Bedwyr Williams’s work)
www.storegallery.co.uk

Gordon Dalton

Gordon Dalton is an artist and writer based in Cardiff.

www.gordondalton.co.uk