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Life at the Meadfoot Bay Hotel
William Mills ABSTRACT ART
William Mills is a young Torbay artist who has successfully exhibited his show-stopping large abstracts across the South West and has sold works as far a eld as Australia. Anita Newcombe calls him for a chat.
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Will’s bold paintings are a joy of colour, light and shade with wonderful texture and depth. Creating works described as Turneresque, he’s being hailed as an emerging English Riviera talent and has won the New Elizabeth Bovill Trophy in 2020.
Just 16 months ago, William Mills quit his job to concentrate full time on his art. He took everything he’d painted to Artizan Gallery in Torquay and spent an hour chatting to owners Julie and Jacob Brandon about where he should be headed. He tells me, “ ey were very encouraging but I was a bit lost – I was painting in a vacuum and had little concept of where to start my journey.”
Will had been painting in earnest since his teens and before that too. After leaving Torquay Boys’ Grammar School in 2011 with 3 A-Levels and 10 good GCSEs, he studied art at King Edward VI College and subsequently took a degree in Film at Falmouth University.
Will then started a sales career with a global software company, sticking it out for four years even though his ADHD made things very di cult for him. He tells me, “It was really tough – a constant battle. ADHD is like a mental incoherence - it’s exhausting in an o ce job. Some days you arrive at your desk and everything just clicks into place, others feel like every thought process is being ltered through six miles of sludge– it takes a big emotional toll.”
Eventually Will realised that the only job he could do while being himself was in art, “Painting has always been the only corner of my life that my ADHD couldn’t penetrate, or complicate”. He explains, “I spent years doubting I’d ever nd a career in which I could be myself, and now I’ve found it.” In his toughest years, painting had become increasingly compulsive and when he managed to buy a small at of his own in Torquay he decided it was time; he ung himself into a full-on world of canvasses, paint, varnishes, applicators and crafting tools.
With help from Artizan Gallery, he has learned how to share his artworks and begin making his mark. He says, “It’s daunting, to take things that you have made, poured over and loved, and then to not only share them, but try and assign a monetary value to them, I don’t think any artist nds that easy”.
Till this point Will had only sold his paintings to family and friends but in June 2019 he sold two large pieces to someone he didn’t know for the very rst time. He says, “It was incredible, life-a rming. I was with my girlfriend when the email came in and it was an unbelievable feeling.”
He has regularly exhibited since 2019 and had his rst solo show ‘Horizons’ at Artizan Gallery in January and February 2020. Many of his sales now come through online art platforms and he has sold pieces to places as far a eld as Australia and across the United States.
Will tells me, “I live an isolated life now – my friends have moved to London and I’ve stayed here in Torquay. But it works for me; the sheer amount of work involved going from nothing, to becoming an established artist in
just a year, is immense.”
Will’s hard work has paid o and he is “close to being self-su cient” now. He explains, “I just want not to have to worry about having enough materials and paint. To wake up every day with the safe knowledge that this isn’t temporary, this isn’t just an expensive hobby, this is my life now.”
I tell Will that Artizan Gallery’s Julie Brandon has told me she believes he has a great talent and that other artists she has spoken to admire his work – a meaningful accolade. She has even told me that he has been compared to the legendary Turner. How does he feel about that I wonder?
He says, “It’s very generous to compare my work to Turner – such atmospheric painting, brooding, turbulent, sweepingly organic yet industrial, and delicate – I love the comparison.” e central theme underpinning William’s work is the ongoing journey in understanding personal identity and how it is shaped over the passage of time. He describes his work as, “rooted in something between seascapes and landscapes, evoking that feeling of gazing over something, far o in the distance.” His paintings are bold and eye-catching and some now grace the walls of beautiful properties in the UK and around the world.
Will has recently won the top bursary for Devon Open Studios, which runs from 12-27 September 2020. As overall winner he has been awarded the Joanna Radford prize. is allows him to exhibit in the prestigious event
without cost, makes a contribution towards his materials and gets him lots of press coverage. Devon Open Studios gives art-lovers the chance to meet artists in their studios right across Devon.
He will spend a total of three months preparing and is hoping to have 20-30 new paintings for the event. He tells me, “I have an aesthetic or visual idea in mind then work around that – everything has the same cohesive language.”
Julie and Jacob at Artizan Gallery are Will’s main touchpoint with the art world and help him a great deal. However, he has also been working recently with an art consultant Ceri Hand, her time being paid for by a Torbay Council Arts Bursary. Will says, “Her main in uence has been to help me understand where my focus needs to be over the coming year. She has opened my eyes to di erent ways of traversing the art world.”
Will’s current position is one of “relentless optimism. is year has been a constant roller-coaster, the highs are so incredibly high, and the lows can be crushing, but I’ve never been happier, I can nally wake up feeling like I’m doing something I’m made to do”.
Devon Open Studios featuring William Mills will be exhibited at Artizan Gallery 7 Lucius Street Torquay TQ2 5NZ from 12-27 September. He will also be featured at the English Riviera Summer Open at Artizan Collective Gallery at 74 Fleet Street Torquay from 22 August – 27 September (see our Arts News section). williammills.co.uk
