Robert Byron Willms (born 1969) is a Canadian sculptor and teacher, best known for creating assembled, abstract steel sculptures.
Willms was born in Abbotsford, British Columbia in 1969 and resides in Edmonton, Alberta.He has lived in Fort St. John, Dawson Creek, Grande Prairie, and Kamloops, which he considers his hometown.
Hide took Willms on, initially as an exhibition preparation volunteer, then as a studio assistant, and eventually as a Master of Fine Arts student at the University of Alberta.
Willms works in the Modernist assembled sculpture tradition begun by Julio González and Pablo Picasso, and continued by David Smith, Anthony Caro, and Willms' mentor, Peter Hide, using solid and sheet steel forms to create heavy, convoluted abstract sculptures.
Art critic Piri Halasz has written, in reference to international contemporary sculpture, "As far as that goes, New York also has no equal to Hide, nor to such up-and-comers as Willms...".