Michael Williams (b. 1936, Patna, India) is a British painter and draughtsman whose landscapes and still lifes are rooted in sustained observation of the visible world.

After attending Hilltop School in Kalimpong, with its view of Mount Kanchenjunga, Williams returned to England in 1946. He studied Modern History at University College, Oxford, from 1957 to 1960, following two years of National Service in the Royal Navy.

In 1960, Williams moved to Paris, where he taught English, studied painting briefly at the Académie de la Grande Chaumière and immersed himself in the city’s galleries, cafés and artists’ studios. During this period, he also appeared in Robert Bresson’s film The Trial of Joan of Arc. Returning to London in 1962, he began teaching at St Martin’s School of Art, eventually becoming Head of Art History and Complementary Studies.

Williams’s early work explored abstraction, collage, constructed relief and the relationship between painting and sculpture. In 1967, his work Hang On was selected for the John Moores exhibition in Liverpool. A decisive change came in 1971, when he moved with his family to rural Radnorshire in Wales. The direct experience of the natural world became the foundation of his practice, and landscape and still life emerged as his principal subjects.

From 1971 to 1980, Williams taught painting at Goldsmiths’ College, where he became the first director of its part-time MA in Fine Art. In 1980, he reduced his teaching commitments to concentrate more fully on his own work, while continuing to lecture and serve as an external examiner at art colleges throughout Britain.

Williams’s subjects have ranged from the hills, quarries and reservoirs of central Wales to the Pembrokeshire coast and the ancient landscapes of Greece. Awarded a Welsh Arts Council travel grant and Greek Government scholarship in 1986–87, he spent seven months painting in the Peloponnese. From 2003, regular visits to the Cycladic island of Paros introduced the clear light, marble cliffs and surrounding sea of Greece into his work.

Williams has lived in the Stroud area since 1996. His recent work has been inspired by the canal, its surrounding trees and the reflections held in its still water. Working through drawing, watercolour, ink and coloured pencil, he builds his images slowly through the accumulation of finely articulated lines, bringing space, light and time into close relationship.

SELECTED DATES

1936 — Born in Patna, India
1944–45 — Attended Hilltop School, Kalimpong, India
1946 — Returned to England
1950–55 — Shrewsbury School
1955–57 — National Service in the Royal Navy
1957–60 — Read Modern History at University College, Oxford
1960–62 — Lived, taught and studied painting in Paris
1962–71 — Lecturer and later Head of Art History and Complementary Studies, St Martin’s School of Art, London
1971 — Moved to New Radnor, Powys, Wales
1971–80 — Lecturer in Fine Art (Painting), Goldsmiths’ College, London
1978–80 — First Director of the part-time MA in Fine Art at Goldsmiths’
1980 — Reduced his teaching commitments to concentrate on painting
1982–96 — External Examiner in Painting at various colleges
1982–96 — Lecturer on the MA Fine Art course in Birmingham
1985–91 — Lecturer in Painting at Cheltenham and Gloucester College of Higher Education
1986–87 — Welsh Arts Council travel grant and Greek Government scholarship to paint in Greece
1989 — Travelled through Eastern Europe, Turkey and Greece
1993 — Invited to act as Purchaser for the Contemporary Art Society of Wales
1996 — Lecturer in Drawing and Art History at the Tate Gallery Summer School
1996 — Moved to the Stroud area
From 2003 — Regular working visits to Paros, Greece
2016 — Awarded Second Prize in the Sunday Times Watercolour Competition
2022 — Moved to a house overlooking the canal near Stroud

SELECTED SOLO AND SHARED EXHIBITIONS

1971 — Greenwich Theatre Gallery, with John Wragg
1978 — Midland Group, Nottingham, with David Gould and Alexander Moffat
1986 — Silk Top Hat, Ludlow
1988 — Shire Hall, Presteigne
1988 — Austin/Desmond Fine Art, London
1991 — Austin/Desmond Fine Art, London
1993 — Silk Top Hat, Ludlow
2000 — Lavit Gallery, Cork, with Stephen McKenna
2005 — BayArt, Cardiff
2008 — The Subscription Rooms, Stroud
2009 — Sladers Yard, West Bay, Bridport
2013 — The Art Stable, Child Okeford
2016 — The Art Stable, Child Okeford
2019 — The Art Stable, Child Okeford
2022 — Drawing into Painting, The Art Stable, Child Okeford
2026 — Landscapes and Still Lifes, Aleph Contemporary, Stroud

SELECTED GROUP EXHIBITIONS

1964 — The London Group
1967 — John Moores Painting Prize, Liverpool
1977 — Tolly Cobbold Eastern Arts Exhibition
1982–92 and 1999 — Royal Academy Summer Exhibitions
1986–96 — 56 Group Wales exhibitions in Britain and Europe
1988–2017 — Singer & Friedlander/Sunday Times Watercolour Competition, exhibited almost annually
1990 — Contemporary Travellers in Greece, Fine Art Society, London
1995 — National Trust Centenary Exhibition, Christie’s, London
1997 — The Pursuit of Painting, Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin
2016 — Sunday Times Watercolour Competition, Second Prize