Candida Powell-Williams (b. 1984, London) lives and works in London. She creates installations which play with the relationship between sculpture, live performance and animation. Her research–based and process led sculptural practice is guided by questions about human attempts to understand ourselves within the chaotic universe through the connection between the materiality of objects, action and belief with a particular interest in notions of spiritualism and power, encryption and symbolism. Often CPW’s sculptural landscapes are a response to researching the slippage that occurs to the meaning of historical artefacts over time, aiming to confront our relationship to memory and storytelling.
Using a range of materials and textures CPW references the shifting meaning of symbols from architecture to talisman, rendering them physical in modular, emblematic forms or prop-like sculptures akin to drawing and characterised by their wobbly geometry, apparently dissolving edges and the intimacy of the handmade. Fabricated in sweet gradients of pinks, purples, yellows and greens, the colours and surfaces coalesce to appear like disneyfied relics.
Sculptures come together in theatrical staging’s animated with fleeting performances exploring gesture, touch and the threshold between our bodies, external environment and kinship to the animal kingdom. These interactions are documented in stuttering layered animations permeating the work with notions of time, presence and absence and addressing the changing nature of sculpture, performance and storytelling in the digital age.
Works
Candida Powell-Williams
…nothing is harder to understand (chariot)
2019
Candida Powell-Williams
World
2019
Candida Powell-Williams
Temple of Sleep
2020
Candida Powell-Williams
Study for the Emperor
2018
Candida Powell-Williams
Seer
2019
Candida Powell-Williams
Double-slit, Waves of light
2020
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Exhibitions
Candida Powell-Williams : Orphidian’s Sequences
30. 7 – 9. 8. 2020
Candida Powell-Williams: The Gates of Apophenia
15. 11. 2019 – 25. 1. 2020
Candida Powell-Williams: Sonic Arrangements in the Infinite Fill
22. 6 – 24. 8. 2019
Candida Powell-Williams: Private: Command Lines
22. 6 – 24. 8. 2019
Candida Powell-Williams: Lessness, Still Quorum
8. 9. 2018
Group Show: Lotus
13. 10 – 25. 11. 2017
Candida Powell-Williams: Cache
1. 7 – 1. 7. 2017
Candida Powell-Williams : Boredom and its Acid Touch
5. 10 – 8. 10. 2017
Candida Powell-Williams: Glissando
3. 10 – 19. 10. 2014
Studio
Candida Powell-Williams in her studio, North London
Podcast | Lockdown Elevenses with Candida Powell-Williams
Candida Powell-Williams, Unreasonable Silence, 2019, tarot deck
The Wellness Formula | Candida Powell-Williams
Press/News
Brexit politics and feminist prophecies: Candida Powell-Williams’s tarot deck by Edwin Coomasaru
25. 8. 2020
Podcast with Candida Powell-Williams: Southwark Park Galleries
30. 6. 2020
The Art Newspaper : Florence Peake returns to earthy elements for empathetic exhibition at Bosse & Baum by Louisa Buck
29. 3. 2019
FLOORR Magazine interview with Candida Powell-Williams by Sonja Teszler
25. 8. 2020
Bea Bonafini and Candida Powell-Williams Editions & Interviews | King and McGaw
8. 4. 2022
Candida Powell-Williams Performance in Nocturnal Creatures, Whitechapel Gallery
3. 7. 2021
Candida Powell-Williams and Sophia Michael Duo Exhibition, Rectory Projects
26. 6. 2021
Orbit Within the Echoes by Candida Powell-Williams
30. 5. 2021
Candida Powell-Williams & Hettie Judah in Conversation | Southwark Park Galleries
22. 6. 2022
Candida Powell-Williams: The Vernacular History of the Golden Rhubarb review by Betsy Porritt
15. 2. 2017
