Sarah McWilliams

Sarah McWilliams is a multidisciplinary artist. She obtained a degree in Fine and Applied Art and Lens Based Media from the University of Ulster in Belfast, and studied documentary photography at the University of Wales College in Newport. After living and working in England for many years, she lately relocated in Northern Ireland, her ‘home’, and started exhibiting her work in the region. McWilliams’ recent artistic developments have focused on painting. Yet, her background in lens-based media and photography remains the bedrock of her practice, and her work often begins with documentation, either from direct observational studies or personal collections of images. In her work she continues investigations which consider place and its link to persons and narratives, themes that have been recurring throughout her present and past artistic outcomes. ‘Since moving back home to Northern Ireland in 2021 my work has seen a more expressive approach to mark making. This, in my opinion, captures the emotional intensity of 'home'. My recent series of painted landscapes are informed from photos and collages created in response to a particular place and then digitally manipulated. The concept behind this process continues to reflect the power of art to transform the debris of modern life, whilst also reflecting the relationship between person and place’. Sarah McWilliams