Lunar Incantations 2010 – 2023

Will sets up his studio subjects as a film director would, employing careful cinematic lighting, juxtaposing objects and actors in environments that are re-presented through the proscenium arch of the picture frame. His cinematographic paintings reference a cut and paste, theatrical aesthetic of pioneer fin-de-siecle film director George Meliés alongside contemporary faux-Victorian neo-Gothic characterisation seen in Tim Burton’s films such as Sleepy Hollow. Will’s cast of characters resemble a theatre troupe who travel in time and space through the stages of his oeuvre. Although Will’s paintings vary in size, their intense detail would bear projection at cinema screen scale. His nocturnal locations are often identified through architecture sharply defined in cold moonlight, whilst carefully costumed characters gaze from their worlds with poignant expression, as if we, the spectators, should have learned something by now. Doves, swans and owls have flown out of the illusionist’s hat in a strobe lit show of animated augury, omens or messengers, referencing Muybridge’s unnatural analysis of natural movement.

Professor Suzie Hanna

It takes time to look into the works of Will Teather and as spectators, contemporary art in the 21st Century doesn’t necessarily rehearse or prepare us for work such as his; in art, as in life, we have become somewhat unused and unpracticed in looking at the allegorical, and once we see the allegories in Teather’s work we have to take time to unravel their narratives and explore their complexity. Post-modern irony and Google scholar will not help us in this project I fear.

Professor Neil Powell