William Hudders
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William Hudder’s Artist Statement:
The creation of my work revolves primarily around the process of personal expression and outward representation. This is a way of working that is constantly surprising and challenges my understanding of the perceptual environment in constantly unexpected and novel ways. The work that I create is all painted from direct observation, using only the sensations and stimulus of the human eye, interacting and working with the subject of concentration. The imagery that I use is primarily chosen as a reflection of the surrounding environment and the inner responses that these images generate. The end result is for me a collaboration of an inner psychology combined with exterior visual stimulus, with the painting created as a record of the combination of these two states and a living symbol of this interaction. By combining this state of inner conceptions and exterior observations the work then generates a sense of friction and creative tension for the active observer.
To paint in this manner is for me to investigate the nature and relation of visual appearances. What I am trying to create are not exclusively representational images, but rather interpretations of representation, filtered through the medium of paint. The act of translating this information is a process that I find reflects and comments on the rich variety of sensation and experience while also pointing to concepts and ideas which are only indirectly related. A successful painting seems to me to lead the viewer into something like a dream world, similar to what we know, but inherently different. It is this similarity and difference, simultaneously, that I am searching for in my paintings.
Some have said that my work looks photo-realistic, but that has never been my intention, nor the effect, when the paintings are seen in real life. The paintings are primarily created as visual documents, with the intention and aims of poetry. What I am interested in is creating a deeper or heightened sensation of visual activity without losing the feeling of the materials and the physical quality of the paint on the canvas. Ideally, this should provide the viewer with a fresh or novel way of viewing the reality of appearances and the imagery of the surrounding world.
As a painter, I am deeply committed to the art of painting and feel that there is still much to be explored within this discipline. The problem for me is how to create paintings that communicate with a contemporary audience, yet also address and expand on the issues brought up by the paintings of the past. I feel that by using the imagery of the contemporary world and combining it with my own personal reactions, I can create paintings that will address a contemporary audience on many different levels.The art of painting has connected me to many different disciplines and ways of thinking not directly related to the visual arts. To create any group of paintings with this in mind is a task I find endlessly fulfilling and satisfying. Hopefully viewers of my work can share this sense of fulfillment and see within my paintings the exploration and discovery of these ideas.
