I hold deeply personal and idealistically public intentions for my art,
which depicts figures culled from the imagination.
FEAR NOT TO APPEAR — 2016, Gowanus Loft
They often appear in crisis, or bear evidence of having passed through an ordeal.
This is a true and obscure part of my own self, which I need to see when I paint them.
I believe that in painting them I am creating a nexus for empathy:
without imagination there is no compassion.
SADR CITY — 2006, mixed media and collage on paper; 50” × 38”
But I also recognize that these strugglers and stragglers metaphorically portray
our shared experience: the inner under-surface of the skin of the world.
Cage Dies Bird Flies (Flythrough) — 2014, Gowanus Loft
The attempt to orientate these figures towards society has been the underlying impetus of my work.
εὖτόπος (“Eutopia”) — 2016, Snug Harbor Cultural Center
Recently I have been at work on an art of public intention.
To do this I have taken U.S. history as my subject.
I view history through a lens of feeling; I pitch my camp with those who are
– to use the title of Charles Mingus’s autobiography –
beneath the underdog.
AMERICA NOW SUITE — 2018, Gowanus Loft
To paint history is to reclaim, re-vision, re-witness,
and sort through the rubble of hope and loss.
My hope is that re-living our shared past via the imagination
can help generate some small glint of community feeling.
Commissions + Inquiries | George Del Barrio
Dale Williams was raised in a working-class Catholic family in suburban Baltimore, Maryland in the 1960s. In 7th grade a nun at the parochial school he attended introduced the students to painting with oil pastels. When he won honorable mention for a work called My Grave in a school exhibition he decided to keep painting. A reproduction of Corot’s Morning, the Dance of the Nymphs, seen in the World Book Encyclopedia, was the first work of art to impress itself on his imagination. Williams has exhibited in various venues in the New York City area, such as the Drawing Center, Kentler International Drawing Space, and the Painting Center. His last solo show, Fear Not To Appear, which highlighted early paintings, drawings & books from 1980–1997, was held at Gowanus Loft in April 2016, under the auspices of The Vanderbilt Republic. His work has been published in BOMB, Ecotone, the Weirderary, Bat City Review, Hayden’s Ferry Review and other print and online journals. He is a 2014 fellow in Printmaking/Drawing/Book Arts from the New York Foundation for the Arts.
SOLO EXHIBITIONS
2019 Puerto Rico se Levanta/DIFFA Pier 92, NY
2018 America Now Suite/Gowanus Loft Brooklyn, NY
2016 Fear Not to Appear/Gowanus Loft Brooklyn, NY
2015 Cage Dies Bird Flies/Gowanus Loft Brooklyn, NY
2012 Wrong Moves, Figurations & Word Pictures 2009-2012/Arthur Berger Gallery at Manhattanville College Purchase, NY
2007 Imaging the Political Soul: Paintings & Books Since 9/11/Brownson Gallery at Manhattanville College Purchase, NY
1996 Sanctuary 2000 – Drawings & Books/Kentler International Drawing Space Brooklyn, NY
SELECT GROUP EXHIBITIONS
2019 Biennial vol. III/BRIC Brooklyn, NY
2016 εὖτόπος/Snug Harbor Cultural Center New York, NY
2014 “Paper Trail”/Van Der Plas Gallery New York, NY
2014 9th Annual Small Works Show/440 Gallery Brooklyn, NY
2014 Paperworks Unbound/WAH Center Brooklyn, NY
2014 Art From the Heart/Gowanus Loft Brooklyn, NY
2014 Common Ground Gowanus/Old Stone House Brooklyn, NY
2014 {Re}HAPPENING Festival/Black Mountain College Asheville, North Carolina
2014 Circumstances/Kentler International Drawing Space Brooklyn, NY
2013 9th Annual Small Works Show/440 Gallery Brooklyn, NY
2013 Working it Out/The Painting Center New York, NY
2012 Living with Others/Giles Gallery at Eastern Kentucky University Richmond, KY
2011 30: A Brooklyn Salon/BRIC Rotunda Gallery Brooklyn, NY
2008 4th Annual Small Works Show/440 Gallery Brooklyn, NY
2006 Drawing Conclusions/projectBLUE Gallery and Workshop Easton, PA
2002 Drawings for Peace/Kentler International Drawing Space Brooklyn, NY
1997 Winter Invitational Show/The Painting Center New York, NY
1997 Figures Lost and Found/New York Public Library at Tompkins Square New York, NY
1995 Unwanted Figures of the Imagination/Police Building Gallery New York, NY
1994 The Painter’s Visit/CB’s 313 Gallery New York, NY
1994 Small Works Show/Gallery Annext New York, NY
1994 Hair – the Long and Short of It/Smithtown Township Arts Council Smithtown, NY
1990 Figurative Expressionism/Gallery David New York, NY
1989 Selections 46/The Drawing Center New York, NY