Writing this column I combine two passions – a love of birds and words. Ink and feathers. Now I’ve met an artist who uses the printed word for a different purpose. Craig Williams frames his paintings of birds with the pages of books, magazines and newspapers.
I discovered Craig’s remarkable art when he was invited to talk at the May meeting of Birdlife Tasmania. Not just a talk, a power-point presentation showcased the best of his work.
In Craig’s art, vintage book pages merge with realistic renditions of birds. The Launceston-based painter sources these unconventional canvases from second-hand bookshops and op-shops to create intentional juxtapositions between painting and printed text. The combination results in pairings that appear to have evolved to complement each other.
As he explains it, the book pages provide a “substrate” to tell the story of his subjects.
“There’s also an underlying story to the piece through the history of the books themselves. This is often evident in the imperfect nature of the paper with blemishes, marks, creases, and wear,” he says.
And it’s not just a typeface that sometimes provides a backdrop. In one work a beautiful songster, the golden whistler, fronts a musical score from a book containing sheet music and a new holland honeyeater is featured among bottlebrushes from a 1950s gardening magazine. In another, an endemic green rosella is set against a map of Tasmania.
The story of a long-distance travelling shorebird, a ruddy turnstone, is suggested by the use of a page from book with a curious title, Nichol’s Concise Guide to the Ministry of Transport Navigation Exams All Grades Volume 1. After discovering the book, Craig realised it had an illustration amid the text explaining latitude and longitude.
Craig brings his background in zoology and experience working in museums and wildlife parks into his creative practice. Without formal training, he experimented with different mediums and styles before settling on what he describes as his “niche” market. He gets commissions from both Australian and foreign bird-lovers.
Williams also uses pages from field guides to pay homage to the history of the reference texts used by birders and to directly relate the illustration to the information on the page.
“While the birds in some works can have a direct link to the page content – identification referring to it from a field guide – others have more discrete and even an intangible relationship to the page contents,” he explained.
“Often the branch on which the bird is perched is left in the underpainting stage with no further details. This allows the text on the page to remain visible. It helps to both tie the bird to the words while also lifting the bird prominently off the background.”
Craig only uses cast-off books long past their shelf-life. With his art he ensures these lost and condemned volumes enter a new chapter.