A conversation with Will Teather on his powerful artworks showing his solipsistic imagination and traditional techniques. 

Transmission 103: Interview with Will Teather

Will Teather is a British artist known for creating modern artworks that combine traditional techniques with a bold, imaginative approach. As a student, he spent time studying masterpieces in major museums across London. His education at Chelsea College of Art & Design and Central Saint Martins shaped his passion for contemporary art and helped develop his unique artistic vision. After completing his studies, Teather began his painting career in the early 2000s, working within East London’s art communes. His career gained momentum in 2007 when he was selected as the Aberdeen Arts Centre’s first Artist-in-Residence. In 2012, he traveled to New York as a recipient of the Ruth Katzman Scholarship, participating in the Artist-in-Residence Program at The Vytlacil Campus.

Featured image: Transference 100 x 120cm Oil and acrylic on canvas
Will Teather’s official site, Facebook, Instagram

Teather’s works are characterized by their ability to evoke different artistic eras, drawing viewers between romanticism and classicism, and leaving them intrigued and captivated by the unexpected. His figurative paintings and drawings often depict curious individuals caught in surreal circumstances. Drawing inspiration from diverse sources, including Flemish still life, baroque art, Weimar painters, and magical realism, Teather engages with the history of painting while infusing it with a contemporary sensibility. His passion for music and theatre has influenced his painting style and led to collaborations with theatre companies such as Les Enfants Terribles and Hocus Pocus Theatre, as well as musicians Andrew Plummer and Ana Silvera. A recurring muse in his work is his wife, Dot Howard, a visual artist and performer. Teather has participated in over 200 gallery exhibitions in the UK and internationally. His recent exhibitions include shows at Underdog London, RJD Gallery New York, Red Dot Miami, Aberdeen Art Gallery, and Norwich Castle Museum, among others. He has also been featured as a guest artist at British Council-sponsored events, including Artwars, Malonny Art Forum in Lithuania, and Artrooms London.

Can you tell a bit about yourself and how you got interested in art?

I have always been interested in art. Some of my earliest  memories are of painting.  I loved it at school but there were also a lot of art history books at home that belonged to my mum. 

Your artworks feature curious characters in uncanny situations. Can you walk us through your creative process when developing these characters and their narratives?

It really depends. They evolve organically.  For instance I might combine a mannequin with a particular mask and prop. Or a model might turn up with some items which I will choose from- I often draw my models from the theatre and circus scene.  And then I imagine the journey the character has been on, what brought  them here and what are their intentions.  I like the way that the simple act of painting mannequins or people in costume seems to create a reality and humanity for them, where they are more real than they were before.

He has participated in numerous international art competitions; he was shortlisted for the Celeste Prize, became a finalist for the London Contemporary Art Prize, and took part in Mayfair’s “Cork Street Open Exhibition.” In more recent years, he has been invited to judge significant art prizes, including the Dubel Prize.

We can also see Magical realism as a significant influence in your paintings. How do you balance the fantastical with the real, and what role does this balance play in conveying your artistic vision?

I am fascinated by the illusionary element of painting and the fact that it has a human life force behind it’s creation.  That is magical and uncanny before we even begin. Magical realism as an idiom differs from surrealism in that it has more to do with our changeable beliefs in what is real and the fluidity this has across different cultures. epochs and contexts.  To some people the earth really is flat for example and witches were once believed to be real, it is all a matter of perspective. The pandemic forced many people to shift their reality, at least temporarily.  I like to change what I believe to see how it feels to inhabit another space.  The theatricality of my work acknowledges the sense of artifice within the work and allows for an element of the extraordinary.  The carnivalesque elements allow a further twisting of reality and an element of subversion.

You draw inspiration from a wide range of sources. How do you integrate diverse elements into a cohesive visual language in your artwork?

My work is very varied but it has a consistent range of themes: an interest in the otherworldly, art history, a sense of movement and hopefully an emotional resonance, for example. I like to take figurative art on a walk and end up somewhere new and a little unexpected.

In recent years, Will Teather, who is also a musician, has led several bands. The most recent was the psych-rock group Vicars of Stiffkey, which signed with Off With Their Records and released an album in 2017.

Your art is in a dialogue with the history of painting. What specific aspects of art history do you find most compelling, and how do you reinterpret them for a contemporary audience?

I am interested in the conventions of realism such as perspective and how these can be manipulated.  Realism is not a scientific process it is an art, and therefore malleable. I love the portals into the past provided by historical paintings and studying the brushwork and geometry underlying them.  I still cannot fathom how some work was made despite spending half my life with a brush in my hand. 

Do you have a specific painting or drawing that holds special meaning for you, due to its narrative, technique, or personal significance? Can you share with us the story behind it?

It varies from day to day but I recently was thinking again about Isabella by Millais.  It is an extraordinary painting, not just for how young he was when he painted it, but how wilfully odd the perspective is.  The table veers off to the left despite being face on to the viewer. – it should disappear towards the central vanishing point of the image, although this would obscure the figures so he thought better of it. His choice serves the narrative  of the composition well, where the figures seem almost stacked like playing cards on either side – it means you can see the drama unfolding clearly.  It is a good example of how something can be completely wrong but entirely right. The end result seems both surprisingly realistic, emotionally charged and uncanny in its strangeness.

Publications such as the International Drawing Annual, Wall Street International, Grazia, Artists and Illustrators, London Evening Standard, The Guardian, The Artist Magazine, Beautiful Bizarre Magazine, American Art Collector, and The Antiques Trade Gazette have featured his artwork.

Your works evoke a sense of otherworldliness. How do you conceptualise the ‘world’ in your paintings, and what are some of the recurring themes or symbols you use to construct it?

Thank you.  I am interested in using props and how these can be galvanised into life when painted.  I like to play with perspective as a compositional device.  I like to use colours that surprise myself and the viewer, creating a slight sense of wrongness. I often want to create a world in which there is a degree of ontological ambiguity where you are not sure exactly what you are looking at. Recurring themes include a sense of carnivalesque and the way certain things can be dead and alive at the same time.

Do you ever revisit older pieces or styles, and if so, how do you approach them with fresh eyes?

All the time but they are ever evolving.  I work in several different styles on the same day quite often, my studio often has several paintings in progress.  I never repeat exactly the same painting though, even when it is the same subject.  I always introduce a new problem into the process, be it a colour I am not used to or a change of medium, ground or brushes.  I might decide to paint with piping for a day.  It keeps me engaged.

Can you walk us through your creative process from initial concept to finished piece? The characters in your paintings often appear as if caught in a moment of transition or transformation. What fascinates you about these moments, and how do you capture their essence?

These questions are in themselves great insights.  Yes I like to feel like someone has been caught in the middle of something.  My process is different depending on which body of work we are talking about.  Sometimes it begins with a process which through following I will create an artwork- such as the fractal paintings, where historical paintings are deconstructed into their energy points – both geometric energy points and emotional ones such as the eyes. These points are used to create repeat patterns which are then used as a lattice to repaint the image.  

Will Teather’s paintings are held in various notable collections both in the UK and abroad, attracting numerous collectors.

When I work with models I will choose a location and encourage the models to bring some suitable props.  I know the kind of thing I am looking for, and will guide the process, but there is quite a bit of improvisation in developing the scene, which is why I favour actors/performers who are used to this. Once I have a scene that feels a little unsettling, unexpected and charged somehow, I will begin work. Often the scene may reflect something I have encountered or witnessed recently.

How do you see your work engaging with contemporary issues or social commentary?

I don’t most of the time.  I am always looking to take painting itself somewhere new, but in terms of wider issues in society I think my work is about escaping this world, heading somewhere more inward or solipsistic.  But I have occasionally looked more outward, such as my baroque scenes of panic buying where the psychodrama of late capitalism suddenly took on a biblical sense of emotion for some people. I have wanted to critique capitalism but it is such a dry subject a lot of the time, so people getting genuinely worked up about missing out on “stuff” seemed a great subject for a painting.

Photos and illustrations courtesy of Will Teather

Dominique Musorrafiti

Ciao! My name is Dominique. I’m Italian and I’m proud to be a mix. My father was an Italian chemical engineer and high school teacher, with Greek and Polish heritage. My mother is Haitian, she was high school language teacher, with Dominican, Spanish, French, Portuguese, African and Native American heritage. Being a mix makes me appreciate to want to understand different cultures and lifestyles. I grew up in Italy, lived few years in Haiti, travel around main European capitals, lived many years in China, in Spain and UK. Traveling makes me feel that we can learn something from every situation in every part of the world.