BEST IN SHOW AWARD
ARKANSAS PASTEL SOCIETY
3RD NATIONAL EXHIBITION
DOUG DAWSON
SELECTION AND AWARDS JUDGE
"I've noticed your work over the years and have seen it progress beyond techniques. You bring something more to the work that is a bit more than your articulated goals - a visual translation of seeing and understanding."
Burt Silverman - master fine artist
"What distinguishes Bill James' portraits (paintings) from many of his contemporaries is their informality. Far from a studio, his characters are not models assuming a role but dancers at a festival, musicians at an outdoor concert, or actors recreating an historic charge. James emphasizes the characters' costume and gesture by often isolating them in fields of pattern and color. Because of James' craft (superb in not one but three media) is so confident, he can create compositions that seem discovered rather than planned. His portraits (paintings) attest to the fact that an artists ambition can coexist with an onlookers delight, yet there is an underside to any joyous occasion, and James renders that as well, which is to say that his work is as serious as it is beautiful."
Maureen Bloomfield - editor of The Artist's Magazine
All images and material copyrighted by Bill James 2007. All rights reserved. No reproduction in any medium may be made without the prior consent of the artist.
