Antony Williams VPRP, NEAC, CBPP

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Antony Williams trained at Farnham College of Art and Portsmouth University. He works almost exclusively in egg tempura which can be a painstaking and exacting medium, but which allows him to express a deep feeling about the look of the world. All of his work is based on direct and intense observation which can produce as a result a very heightened sense of realism, where every surface detail is given almost equal and constant consideration.

Art critic Martin Gayford writes:

“When Williams paints human faces and bodies in tempura= whether his own, for that of another sitter - he makes the viewer intensely aware of surface detail. One sees, more intensely perhaps than one does in life, the little marks of wear and tear, the furrows and wrinkles.

Williams’ still lives and portraits - like much art - underline the passing of time and mortality. This was the reason no doubt why his fine portrait of the Queen caused controversy. Inevitably, his method, his close vision, revealed that these were in fact the face and hands of an ageing woman. That is not how everybody chooses to think of the monarch. But as a work of art, and an exercise in sober, careful truth - telling like the best of his work - was indeed, very impressive”

Antony won the ??? Prize in 2024 and is currently the Vice President of the Royal Society of Portrait Painters, as well as being a member of the New English Art Club and the Contemporary British Portrait Painters..