I often get asked the what “Hilary at the circus” means. In hindsight it’s not actually a great handle given that the “at” is so often confused with @, but I have never decided to change, and because of that I’ve kept reminding myself why I use it. It all started 25 years ago!
Back in 2000, I was already and artist and screen printer and also a vegan and half punk rock college kid living in Oakland, CA attending California College of Arts and Crafts. My friends and fellow artists printed our own stickers, patches and music or protest posters too. I thought that the internet and TV were doing no good to society and some of my most used and passed out stickers read “Net Free!”. This one was also a favorite of mine…
Back then I also loved images of the circus and its characters, with clowns and animals wearing circus outfits being common figures I drew as well as circus tents and decorations. I think at the time I felt like my depictions of this imagery was somehow a critique of consumer/capitalist society being some grandiose performance with a hidden dark side, contrasting with the fun and ridiculous sides of life as well.
When I eventually did give in to the pressures to be online in 2005, have email, and a website to promote and sell my art, I knew I did not want the more “stuffy” feeling Hilary Williams Fine Art. I wanted something more fun, so I decided on “Hilary at the circus”. Although my inner angst towards the world had softened a bit I still felt like a circus was a way to describe this life and that it would be a fitting and fun representation of me and my art work.
Today I still think it’s fitting, although as I mature into middle age I admit I may just pick the boring “Hilary Williams Fine Art” if I had to start over, but at this point the monicker is part of my identity too. Now when people ask, and I say, “ because life is a circus!”, what I mean by that has become a little broader. Life is surreal, crazy, a little messed up and hard, raucous, full of oddballs, magical, beautiful, colorful, awe inspiring, mind bending and death defying. Although my current work features natural landscapes and its characters, and I choose to focus more on the joyful and awesome rather than the dark side, I think that some of these adjectives can still describe these works or the feelings they may bring up. “Hilary at the circus” can still be a description of the world which I inhabit and create from.
