“Primordial Fleamarket: Sometimes the communist household object strikes you as having been made in geological times, rather than some manufacturing era. Glorified objects . . . rarefied.” Wendy Low echoed this quote from Janet Thayer Williams when she asked, “Who can look at a whisk broom and not think of the stitching in Janet’s painting?”
Friends of the William’s family gathered on Laburnum Crescent today to remember Janet. Someone made a convincing argument that Janet was still with us. Her paintings were were on display throughout the house and once I found this one, “Wite Out” from 2006, I stayed put beneath it. I first saw it in the tunnel between the new downtown library and the old building across the street. They often display art there and this painting stopped me dead on my tracks. The typewriter keys sang and leapt off the canvas as if some fantastic story was unfolding. It wasn’t on the page. It was somewhere between the mind, the keys and the page. I told Janet how much I loved it.
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She was a beautiful person, with a dry, refined sense of humor. Thinking about her paintings, which are so great, which remain in my memory years after seeing them, helps me look forward to my own artistic future.
Artists don’t need to be popular to be good. Attention from an important friend can be better than that of a group. Janet & Ted always inspired me in their support of each other, & I think they inspired each other too. Creatively, I mean. I can identify. Two very critical people doing artistic projects & evaluating each other throughout. We should all be so lucky.Lots of love for both of them.