On a drizzly Tuesday, Jon and I headed off to Brighton to visit Kathy Williams’ new interactive painting exhibition, ‘Just Paint (& play)’. Williams, an installation artist and painter, creates 3D and interactive paintings inspired by the spaces in which they exist. In this case, the background, or indeed foreground, for Williams’ ‘Just Paint (& play)’ is the expansive glass window of the Brighton Jubilee Library. The joy of Williams’ gestural marks is immediately apparent. They are painted on hostaphan (melinex) which is a strong, transparent polyester, and hang inside, on the Library’s windows. In bright greens and yellows they project beautifully over the readers sheltering from the rain this Tuesday.
However, the artwork does not end here. The huge abstract marks lying inside the library invite anyone and everyone to see these gestures and make their own outside, on the other side of the glass. Although separated by the panes, the two sides are in conversation with each other, both in the making and in the outcome. Viewers are encouraged to make their marks on the outside, and then go into the Library and look at the entire artwork as one from the inside. Williams’ own marks, vibrant and emotive, mesh confidently with the paintings outside. We are reminded of the importance of perspective, and the individuality of responses to art.
She is effusive about her work. The personal interactions she has seem to fill her with excitement, yet she tells us that she originally hated the idea of it. She talks about struggling with relinquishing control over her work, and allowing others to be part of it. Initially, Williams wanted to ensure that all the marks made by the public were abstract, but once she gave up on that idea, she found inspiration even in the most figurative of designs. Despite an initial reticence, she seems completely at home outside the Brighton Library, armed with paints, brushes and copious fairy liquid. Public engagement is key to the artwork as a whole, and without her unrestrained enthusiasm, the results wouldn’t be quite so strong. She talks about approaching people as ‘reaching a cliff and then going over it’, with fascinating results. Chatting to people about what they think of the art is a conversation starter and proves that everyone has something to say about art. Williams thrives in the public where she can meet people from different places and different demographics and learn something about her own practice along the way.
One woman came along to ask if Williams would be back on the weekend, since her granddaughter would love to be a part of it. Williams asked if she instead would like to take part, to which she said she didn’t know how. She left, only to return ten minutes later saying, ‘You know what, I’m turning 75 in 12 hours, why wouldn’t I give this a go?!’, and grabbed a brush. It’s these little success stories that seem to drive Williams. Her ethos of the democracy of art is all about letting people know that anyone can talk about art, even if they feel like they don’t have the ‘right’ language. Williams feels passionately that art belongs to everyone, especially those who feel excluded from the world. When the woman merrily started dabbing red dots onto the window, she told us that she hadn’t an ‘artistic bone in her body’. Williams replied, ‘Me neither’.
Although many children were taking part in the exhibition and enjoying it, it is the adults whom Williams sees as the real successes of her piece. She says it is always harder to encourage adults to get involved, one assumes because these are the people with the most assumptions about art and what ‘sort of people’ art involves. She wants to attract people who wouldn’t usually define themselves as ‘artistic’ and feel they don’t understand the language. For Williams, the importance of this lies in the experiencing rather than explanation. The experience of picking up a paintbrush and choosing a colour, choosing a shape and identifying the urge is the most important to her. It means that the piece eventually created is a mesh of personal reactions to Williams’ own work and encouragement.
As much as ‘Just Paint (& play)’ is about the artwork eventually created, this act of doing is just as important. The activity of painting on the way home, on the way out, or with a friend, brings unexpected joy and creativity to the mundane. The end result is almost negligible, since the paint on the outside will be scraped off at the end of the day. The perpetuity exists both in the memories created, and in the photos taken. Williams is fascinated by the proliferation of photo-snapping on phones. She loves that these images, taken quickly and without too much thought, provide different insights into her work. She enjoys the fact that each photo focuses in on different parts of the creation. The nature of her work’s focus on the interactive, the 3D, and the environment within which it exists nurtures the importance of these alternative visions. She explores these ideas through her Instagram account, @thepaintingisee. Here she invites people to send in photos they’ve taken of her work and the different perspectives they find in her work. The photos make their own abstract paintings that Williams ‘would never have seen’. This democracy of vision and perception is key to her vision.
Williams’ next project is for the Ventnor Fringe festival this weekend, on the Isle of Wight. It will develop her ideas about movement and art and she is planning a painted sphere of movement hanging above the cliffs. It is inspired by ideas of shelter, belonging and safety and once more is fundamentally motivated by inspiring people to engage with art, whoever they are and whatever their background.
All photos are taken by Jon Archdeacon.