Geoff Todd Explained

Honorific Suffix:AM
Birth Place:Chelsea, Victoria, Australia
Nationality:Australian
Style:Contemporary figurative style in Drawing, Painting and Sculpture

Geoff Todd (born 1950 in Chelsea, Victoria) is an Australian artist and social commentator and has a contemporary figurative style in drawing, painting and sculpture. Geoff Todd works between studios in Winnellie, NT, and Ararat, Victoria.

Early life and education

Geoff Todd grew up on a small dairy farm in Gippsland, Victoria.[1] [2]

Geoff Todd worked as an art teacher in several Victorian State Technical schools during the 1970s and 1980s. While teaching at Monterey Secondary College in 1980, he took a half-year residency at the Victorian College of the Arts in Melbourne before heading to Maningrida in Arnhem Land in the Northern Territory of Australia in 1984, where he served as a craft adviser.[3] Following his departure from Maningrida in 1987, Todd worked as an Art Lecturer at Batchelor Institute in Rum Jungle, Northern Territory, before becoming a part-time Sculpture Lecturer at Charles Darwin University, also in the Northern Territory.

Exhibitions

Todd began his career as an artist in the mid-1970s. He gained recognition for his "Book Sculptures," which were first exhibited at Powell Street Gallery in Melbourne in 1978 and later showcased in Australia and the UK. In 1984, he presented an exhibition of "Dictionary Paintings" at Christine Abraham's Gallery, incorporating silk screen, etching, wood block prints, and collage to reproduce well-known magazines, children's storybooks, and an illustrated dictionary.[4]

Throughout his career, Todd has executed public commissions, including the facades of the Supreme Court of the Northern Territory and the Northern Territory Parliament House in 1994.[5] [6] His artistic contributions have extended to Indonesia, where his work is held in various museums' permanent collections in different cities. Some of his pieces have been acquired by the Northern Territory Museums and Art Galleries' permanent collection.[7] [8]

In 1999, Todd held an exhibition at Benteng Vredeberg (The Dutch Fort) in Yogyakarta, Java, which was inaugurated by Prince Prabukusomo, the younger brother of the current Sultan Hamengkubuwono X of Yogyakarta. This exhibition garnered positive responses, establishing Todd as a respected artist both in Indonesia and Australia."[9]

His figurative work reveals intimate, personal and sometimes erotic connections with his subjects, while pursuing broader themes."In a career spanning over forty years Geoff Todd's practice has consistently expressed his commitment to social justice and activism, while also reflecting his responses to wider political issues ranging from the so-called 'Bali Nine' arrests in 2005, to September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks.[10] Figurative art led Todd to translate three-dimensional form into two-dimensional drawing and painting. About his portrait of Judas Iscariot, the American author Susan Gubar writes "Todd's image emphasizes guilt, remorse, a conviction about one's own worthlessness. Less a demon, more a monk or mendicant, a hopeless Judas atoning in desolate silence clarifies how it feels to be John's son of perdition, an anathema."[11] [12] in 2017, The Darwin gallery, Framed, featured Todd's work for their closing exhibition after thirty years . The solo show along with the book, "Reflections" revealed thirty years of the artist's work and his thought processes.[13] [14]

In 2019, he was recognized as a Member of the Order of Australia (AM) in the Australia Day Honours for his "significant service to the visual arts as an artist and sculptor."[15]

Other work

Book design & illustration

Publications & catalogues

Television

Rebgetz, Louisa, "Territory Artist's Playful Exhibition", ABC, "7:30 Report", Darwin,15 June 2012 [5.19 duration][18]

Notes and References

  1. Book: 0-9756775-0-0. Looking North: The Art of Geoff Todd : Outsider, Maverick & Humanist. Lindsey. Tim. Hines. Toby. 2004. Zebu Press .
  2. Book: Lindsey . Tim . Looking North: The Art of Geoff Todd : Outsider, Maverick & Humanist . Hines . Toby . 2004 . Zebu Press . 0-9756775-0-0.
  3. Crossing Country- The Alchemy of Western Arnhem Land, Art Gallery of New South Wales Publications
  4. The Australian, 31/08/1978
  5. Northern Territory Chronicle 1974-1998
  6. Looking North. The Art of Geoff Todd
  7. Web site: It's a pop life: Leo Sayer launches Geoff Todd's pop art exhibition - ABC (none) - Australian Broadcasting Corporation . 2023-10-23 . www.abc.net.au.
  8. Web site: Walton . Inga . September 2013 . Melburnin September 2013 . 2023-10-23 . Trouble Mag.
  9. Web site: Past Editions. 9 March 2017. 23 March 2017. https://web.archive.org/web/20170323161028/http://www.florencebiennale.org/en/past-editions/. dead.
  10. Walton, Inga, "War Paint: Protest & Social Activism in the works of Geoff Todd", in Art Monthly Australia Issue 264, October, 2013, p. 25-29
  11. Todd, Geoff, Artful Drawing from the Nude, OTH Gallery Publication, 2009
  12. Gubar, Susan, Judas: A Biography, W.W. Norton & Co, New York, 2009, p. 252, 254-55.
  13. Web site: 2013-11-01 . Trouble November 2013 by Trouble Magazine - Issuu . 2023-10-23 . issuu.com . en.
  14. Web site: Maddox . Elicia Murray and Garry . 2008-05-13 . Well hung painting causes a stir . 2023-10-23 . The Sydney Morning Herald . en.
  15. Web site: Geoffrey David Todd . 2019-01-27 . honours.pmc.gov.au.
  16. Web site: 2016-03-02 . Geoff Todd Beautiful Beasts . 2023-10-23 . Artist Profile . en-US.
  17. Book: Crossing country : the alchemy of western Arnhem Land art. Altman. Jon C.. Perkins. Hetti. Art Gallery of New South Wales. 2004. Art Gallery of New South Wales. 073476359X. Sydney.
  18. Web site: Stories. .

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