Kyffin Williams : The Light and the Dark

In Kyffin Williams’ centenary year, this monograph examines the life and work of an artist who, over six decades from Slade student to Royal Academician to knighthood, achieved both success and remarkable popular appeal.

Best known for his rendering of the Welsh landscape, Williams conjured the mountains of Snowdonia with an instinct that stemmed from knowing every inch of the terrain since boyhood. Yet he was primarily conditioned by a European aesthetic. His espousal of a bold and thickly impasto painting-knife technique, using characteristic close tones, owes much to the affinity he perceived with Vincent van Gogh, but also with the French-Russian Nicolas de Staël, whose canvases he greatly admired.

Williams’ own passionate commitment to his craft and a restlessly creative make-up meant that his output was prolific across different media and genres. Indeed, his portraiture was regarded as highly as his landscapes. Featuring some of the finest examples of an impressive oeuvre, this book – scholarly robust and visually enticing – is essential reading for all those who appreciate the importance of this gifted British painter.

Rian Evans is a writer and critic whose extensive work on Kyffin Williams has appeared in various publications. She is the editor of the Collected Poems of John Ormond.

Nicholas Sinclair is an internationally renowned portrait photographer who has specialised in photographing artists for 30 years. His work has been widely published and exhibited and is held in public collections across Europe. He has published two previous monographs on Kyffin Williams.