Bernard Williams

Artist Information

Born: Chicago, IL
Currently Resides: Chicago, IL

Contact Information:
Bernardartist (at) aol (dot) com

Medium(s) Worked in:
Painting
Sculpture
Metalwork
Murals
Installation

Representation:
G.R. N’Namdi, Chicago,IL

HPAC Exhibitions

2005, solo show, The Ornamental Systems of Louis Sullivan

Available for Commissions: Yes

Artist Bio

Bernard Williams is a native (b. 1964) of Chicago, Illinois. He holds a BFA Degree from the University of Ill. at Champaign-Urbana, and a Master of Fine Arts Degree from Northwestern University in Evanston, IL. He also studied at the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture, Maine, 1987. Williams taught art at The School of the Art Institute of Chicago from 1991-2003.

The artist has been commissioned to create enormous outdoor murals around Chicago and abroad. Mural commissions have been sponsored by a range of organizations and corporations including AT&T, GATX Corp., Kraft Foods, the Snite Museum of Art at the Univ. of Notre Dame, Indiana, Chicago Dept. of Cultural Affairs, and the Jackson Public School District, Jackson, MS. He is represented by the G.R. N’Namdi Gallery in Detroit and Chicago.

In 2003 the artist was selected as a resident artist at the prestigious Fine Arts Works Center in Provincetown, Massachusetts. He was supported there for seven months (Oct.2003-May2004) pursuing independent projects.

Bernard Williams has received strong recognition as a painter and sculptor both regionally and nationally. In 2003 and 2007 Williams was awarded an Illinois Arts Council Grant of $7000. In 2001 the artist was among 20 artists from Chicago and San Francisco to be awarded a $10,000. grant from the Artadia Foundation to continue studio work. He has been featured at the Mississippi Museum of Art in Jackson, MS (2001), and the African-American Museum in Dallas, TX (2002). Selected group exhibitions include the Chicago Cultural Center, 2002, Mary and Leigh Block Museum of Art, Evanston, 2001, Dowd Fine Arts Gallery, Cortland, NY 2002, and The Eiteljorg Museum of Native American and Western Art, Indianapolis, IN 1999.

In 2004 the artist gained gallery representation in New York City. He debuted as a featured artist in the cutting edge SCOPE NY EXPO with Ethan Cohen Fine Arts. Exhibitions and showings are scheduled in New York and Miami with Ethan Cohen Fine Arts. In 2005 the artist will do an exhibition with the Hyde Park Art Center and at Chapman University in Orange, California. In 2006, after a three month residency at the Kohler Art Center in Kohler, WI, the artist was awarded a contract to produce a permanent sculpture for the Chicago Transit Authority.

Artist Statement

Recent developments in my work involve the display of large cut-out forms that lean against a wall or get stored in a large rack. The forms or symbols originate from a diverse range of cultural and historical material. This display is meant to be a very versatile work, adaptable to various spaces and able to strike up a dialogue with most any surrounding. I hope to show this collection in various forms at expos, parks, museums, churches, historical societies or historical sights, and culture centers of various persuasions. The Culture Rack or Culture Cargo is an on-going work that will grow to include a vast number of objects stored in multiple racks and containers. In very large spaces the racks may be stacked on top of each other or lined together. In other displays, the forms will interlock with one another to become free-standing sculptures.

This work grows from my continuing investigation of American and World history and culture, along with related interests in archeology, cartography, and ethnology. In many of my works, signs and symbols are collected and arranged in order to speak about the complexities of history and human development and movement through the ages. Retrieving and reinterpreting details of history and culture are central to my impulses. Multiple stories and fragments are layered and lined onto my canvases or chosen surface. The viewer is urged to consider his or her place in the forceful flow of culture and events.

I attempt to appropriate some of the practices of museums. These institutions around the world hold and collect vast stores of objects, images, and information. Materials are displayed or held carefully out of sight. In many of my works, I display fragments and personal discoveries that are then presented with familiar objects or symbols. They are highly graphic, congested diagrams that mimic historical collections. The works investigate symbolic and associative histories. The interpretations are impulsive and intuitive. They are attempts to manage the overwhelming complexities of constructing histories which evoke radically differing worldviews.

I am developing a body of work that includes a large degree of versatility in presentation. I want the work to be adaptable to various exhibition spaces, even vast spaces, or somehow connected to architecture. Maybe some work is attached to buildings….a kind of strange ornament.

Additional Information

Past Commissions: 2004, Collaborative Mural commission,Indiana University-Purdue Univ. Fort Wayne
2004, Mural Commission, Eastern Illinois Univ. and Charleston,IL Tourism
2005-06, Evanston Art Center, Sculpture on the Grounds Project

2006, Chicago Park District, (temporary)Outdoor Sculpture benches created for Austin Park

2007, Chicago Transit Authority

Press: Lisa Stein,Williams brings his vision of America’s History indoors,Chicago Tribune, Feb.16,2003

Rob Stroud, “Mural-ity Tale, Charleston, IL Times Courier,June 25,2004

Charlie Roduta, ” A Diverse Project” The News Sentinel, Fort Wayne,IN March 26,2004

Robert Loerzel, “Sculptor Unloads Cultural Cargo”, Pioneer Press, Evanston, IL June 9,2005

Daniel Schulman, “Bernard Williams: Reclaiming Louis Sullivan”,Exhibition Catalog Hyde Park art Center, Chicago, IL, 2005

Misc.: Bernard has created various outdoor community based murals in Chicago

Copyright © 2006 A:LIST.

Hyde Park Art Center