Saul Williams was born on the peninsula at North Caribou Lake, Ontario in 1954. He began drawing and painting at a young age and by the summer of 1969 he sold his first painting for 5 dollars. Williams held his first art show at York University in 1971 and became a valued member of the Triple K Co-operative; an Indigenous controlled silk screening collective. His paintings are now held in the McMichael Gallery in Kleinberg and the Woodland Indian Cultural Education Centre in Brantford, Ontario; the Royal Ontario Museum, the New College in Toronto as well as many private collections in North America.
Williams paints for both internal and external audiences. On one level he see himself as a record keeper of his people’s beliefs and traditions, while at the same time on a whole other level he is painting to share knowledge that will help create mutual understandings between Indigenous and Non-Indigenous Peoples.
Williams attributes much of his creative ability to his uncle, Mayo Quequish who was always drawing and creating cardboard replicas of airplanes and other objects seen in Ontario’s far north. Williams liked this merger of art practices with the experience of personal daily life. Over the years he has combined artistic pursuit with a series of jobs: carpentry; firefighting, dockhand, art teacher in northern schools and school counsellor.
 |
Seagulls by Williams, Saul |
Work Cited
