Cloud Formation Painting

ARTIST BIOGRAPHY Todd Bradway is a representational painter based in Brooklyn, New York. He attended Pratt Institute and the New York Academy of Art, where he studied with Steven Assael, Vincent Desiderio and Wade Schuman. In 2004 he was a recipient of the New York Academy of Art's Third Year Research Fellowship. Concurrently to developing his studio practice, Todd Bradway has worked intensively at the intersection of illustrated book publishing and the visual arts. For twenty years he worked with Artbook/D.A.P., where he was Director of Title Acquisitions, overseeing the company’s in house publishing program. More recently he was Director of Publishing at David Zwirner Books, which he launched in 2014 as a standalone program. He currently acts as an independent book consultant working with artists, museums, galleries, and publishers, assisting with all aspects of editorial direction, production and distribution. ARTIST STATEMENT Todd Bradway’s psychological, figurative paintings present an evocative world of ambiguous narratives, anonymous, often solemn-looking characters in dark dream like spaces, and haunted depictions of nature. His depictions of figures trapped in moments that they can’t seem to control or under the influence of those who hold power over them, reveal humanity caught in a fugue state. Often caught in open ended, dreamlike states that can be viewed simultaneously agony and ecstasy, entrapment and reflection, these are figures for which we can relate to feel empathy for as we can understand the intimacy of their moments and the weight of their felt losses. Even the simplest of moments, such as those of leisure, are charged with an unavoidable sense of unease. Seen in total, seemingly contradictory states of being are depicted with a secular attitude and unusual depth of emotion. Throughout a dark, even sometimes apocalyptic, view of humanity persists yet the works themselves are rendered in a deeply empathetic way regardless of the violence depicted.