A new art exhibition celebrates an artist and former Ysgol Penglais, Aberystwyth, teacher who has dedicated her life to art.

Ann Williams, 78, spoke to the Cambrian News about the launch of her retrospective exhibition, Making.Teaching.Collecting, which documents the importance of art throughout her life.

“Art has been, except for having my family and children, the most significant part of my life,” she explained.

“Art was everything. It was always a driving force, but I don’t know why, I had this compulsion to be an artist and to be an art teacher.”

The exhibition is split into three sections and is on display at MOMA in Machynlleth until 18 January.

The first section, entitled Making, displays her own artwork from over the years.

Her work, which is both 2D and 3D, explores numerous media; charcoal, inks, acrylic paint and paper collage.

Ann’s desire to be an artist started from a young age and her creative inspiration is clearly rooted in her environment.

“My upbringing in the mining valleys of South Wales made a strong impression on my visual memory – the intricate pattern of houses ranged along the hillsides, the towering pit heads.”

Ann continued: “I came to Aberystwyth in the ‘60s and was very influenced by the shapes of chapels and farms within a more rural landscape.”

Two 3D collage pieces exhibited in MOMA demonstrate the change in Ann’s perspective when she moved from the industrial valleys to rural Aberystwyth.

The first is a collage of a woman, with her hair in curlers, leaning out precariously of a window as she cleans the glass pane.

Ann explained that, as a child, she would watch women in the valleys, including her aunt, clean their windows in the same way.

“It was all about the pride that the women took in their houses, a lot of working class women who are proud of living in an industrial place.”

See this week’s south papers for the full feature, available in shops and as a digital edition now