This exhibition celebrates Claudia Williams’ 80th birthday and coincides with the publication of a lavishly illustrated book about her life and work, ‘An Intimate Acquaintance’, written by Harry Hauser and Robert Meyrick.

Claudia’s gift for drawing was evident as a child and at the age of sixteen she attended Chelsea School of Art, where her draughtsmanship was recognised with a scholarship. In 1954 she moved to north Wales and married the artist Gwilym Prichard, and so began their remarkable shared life of painting. In the early 1980’s they travelled through Europe, settling in France in 1985, where they lived for fifteen years and where Claudia’s work is also highly regarded. In 1995 Claudia was awarded the Silver Medal by the Academy of Arts, Sciences and Letters in Paris, in recognition of her contribution to the arts in France. She returned to live in Wales in 2000.

Claudia’s paintings and drawings usually reflect the domestic world of children and grandchildren, family gatherings and seaside trips. She has also touched on more controversial issues, notably the drowning of Tryweryn. Her obvious love of the subject matter, allied with a rigorous eye for composition and colour, and the quality of her draughtsmanship combine to produce paintings of great integrity and broad appeal.

She has exhibited widely and her work is featured in many important public and private collections. Claudia was elected to the Royal Cambrian Academy in 1979 and she is an Honorary Fellow of Bangor University. A hugely popular retrospective was held at the National Library of Wales in 2000, and an exhibition of her powerful and moving Tryweryn paintings was shown there in 2010. The National Museum Wales recently acquired her painting 'Mother and Child' for the National Collection.

Many of the paintings in the exhibition are illustrated in the book, and all the work is for sale.