"I think most artists find it difficult to part with their work but it's the parting that keeps us alive and keeps us working. In the case of the chariot, although it's been sold I actually still have it, just in another form"
About this Quote
Artists love to romanticize possession: the studio as a private kingdom, the finished piece as an extension of the self. Kit Williams cuts against that sentimentality with a practical paradox: it is separation, not attachment, that sustains the artist. The line about parting "keeping us alive" has the bite of lived experience. If you never let a work leave you, you never make room for the next one. Selling isn’t just commerce; it’s an enforced ending, the kind that stops creative life from curdling into hoarding, perfectionism, or endless tinkering.
Williams is also quietly rewriting what ownership means. "Although it's been sold I actually still have it, just in another form" is less mystical than it sounds, and more strategic. He’s pointing to the artist’s real asset: not the object, but the idea, the pattern, the capacity to reconstitute the work through memory, sketches, documentation, or a later reimagining. The chariot becomes a case study in artistic afterlife, where the physical artifact can exit your hands while the conceptual imprint remains yours to carry forward.
Context matters here because Williams is an author-artist whose career sits at the intersection of storytelling, image-making, and collectible culture. In that world, objects circulate, accrue value, and become mythologized. His quote deflates the fetish of the original while defending the artist’s continuity: you can lose the thing and still keep the work, because the work was never only the thing.
Williams is also quietly rewriting what ownership means. "Although it's been sold I actually still have it, just in another form" is less mystical than it sounds, and more strategic. He’s pointing to the artist’s real asset: not the object, but the idea, the pattern, the capacity to reconstitute the work through memory, sketches, documentation, or a later reimagining. The chariot becomes a case study in artistic afterlife, where the physical artifact can exit your hands while the conceptual imprint remains yours to carry forward.
Context matters here because Williams is an author-artist whose career sits at the intersection of storytelling, image-making, and collectible culture. In that world, objects circulate, accrue value, and become mythologized. His quote deflates the fetish of the original while defending the artist’s continuity: you can lose the thing and still keep the work, because the work was never only the thing.
Quote Details
| Topic | Art |
|---|---|
| Source | Help us find the source |
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