biography of William WILLIAMS OF NORWICH (1727-1791)

Birth place: Bristol (England)

Death place: Bristol

Addresses: Phila., 1747-60; Jamaica, 1760-63; Phila., 1763-75; England, 1776-91

Profession: Portrait painter, decorative and scenic artist, drawing and music teacher, novelist

Studied: self-taught

Work: NPG, Wash., DC; BM; Newark (NJ) Mus.; Winterthur Mus., Wilmington, Del.; Yale Univ. Art Gal.

Comments: Noteworthy as being as the first teacher of Benjamin West, Williams came to Phila. in 1747 as a mariner, established himself as a portrait painter, reportedly helped build the first theatre in the city, and also did theatrical scene painting for the city's Hallam theatre company. He met West about 1750 at the request of patron Samuel Shoemaker, who asked that Williams show the boy one of his paintings. This he did, also giving West some instruction and books, including his own unpublished manuscript Lives of the Painters." Williams' portraits are tightly detailed, with the figures usually posed within elaborate stage-like settings that show his associations with the theatre. Among his most well-known works are his portraits of Deborah Hall (Brooklyn Mus.) and Benjamin Lay (NPG), the latter of which was commissioned by Benjamin Franklin. Williams also painted several fine full-length figural group portraits or "conversation pieces." In 1760, he traveled to Jamaica, returning in 1763 to Philadelphia. He was still painting in the Colonies as late as 1775, but about 1776 went back to Bristol (England), where he posed for a figure in West's "The Battle of La Hogue." Williams spent his last years in the Merchants' and Sailors' almshouse in Bristol, and on his death left a patron the manuscript of his adventure novel, The Journal of Llewellyn Penrose, a Seaman (which was loosely based on his own life at sea). Although Williams recorded that he had painted 141 works in his lifetime, only fourteen have been located (as of 1987).

Sources: G&W; Sawitzky, "William Williams" and "Further Light on ... William Williams"; Flexner, "The Amazing William Williams" and "Benjamin West's American Neo-Classicism with Documents on West and William Williams"; Prime, II, 13; Gottesman, I, 7. More recently, see David Howard Dickason, William Williams, Novelist and Painter of Colonial American, 1727-1791 (Bloominton, IN, 1970); Saunders and Miles, 207, 225-26; Baigell, Dictionary; 300 Years of American Art, 48."