#61 Drawing

James S. Williams has been making art since he copied the cool hot rod t-shirt designs of Stanley Mouse as a teenager. Born in Memphis, Jim grew up in Dallas and studied art and sculpture at Stephen F. Austin State University and North Texas University. In 1972, Jim moved to Austin, joining the counter-culture lifestyle which offered a low cost of living, eclectic array of creatives, and burgeoning music and art scene. In 1975-76 Jim owned Just Imagine Arts, a gallery on 6th Street where he showed local and Texas artists. Jim continued studying art through workshops on photography and silkscreen printing at Dougherty Cultural Arts Center. A practitioner of martial arts since the early 1960s, Jim has taught tai chi with Four Seasons Tai Chi the past 13 years. The earliest influence on Jim’s artistic vision was 1950s car design, both European and American. As a teen, he designed his own futuristic model cars. Along with classic automotive design, he draws from a variety of influences including the art work of Franz Kline, Paul Klee, Chilean artist Roberto Matta, and pop icon Tom Wesselmann, as well as Chinese and Japanese calligraphy. Inspired by his training as a sculptor, Jim has spent his artistic career exploring the ambiguity of three-dimensional objects in space and cultivating a practice of allowing the present moment and gestures of the brush to guide his work.