Will Bates is a gender non-conforming interdisciplinary artist with specialties in painting and sculpture. They will complete a Multidisciplinary Bachelor of Art Degree with emphasis in Studio Art, Art History, and Museum Studies in 2026 and they intend to pursue a masters in Historic Restoration. They were published in the Women’s, Gender and Sexuality Studies Capstone Project, Art as Resistance, and participated in a duo exhibit, Bible Bodies, at the University Center Gallery at UM in 2025.
For the last year, Will has been transforming mannequin parts into colorful sculptural scrolls of their childhood with gel image transfers of family photos, exploring the intersection of religion, identity, and the body.
Artist Statement
My purpose is to capture the way memories are felt, not just remembered; the way memories skew and become more complex as I age. Each piece is a reflection of the emotional echo-chamber that I've built to sit with harmful memories and heal from the trauma inflicted on the relationship between my identity and my body. I do this by revisiting a memory repeatedly through journaling, finding a state of rumination within myself time and time again during the creation process. I often include lettering in my work that are bites of repetitive thoughts I’ve had during the rumination process. I use intense color in a very purposeful manner to represent the different emotions brought up in this echo-chamber. Many of my memories are not pleasant, but the photos taken around these memories are simple, almost untainted. The photo tells two stories, the one you see, and the one you feel. Removing the figure from its background, its original context, allows me to reveal the emotional story behind the memory.