Tony Woods: Archive
September 2013
A new book has been released tracing the fifty-year career of Melbourne-based artist, Tony Woods. Edited by curator Andrew Gaynor, this large and lovely-looking publication contains essays by friends and colleagues of the artist – including the architect and poet Alex Selenitsch and artist Phil Edwards – which nicely embellish the bare bones biographical information previously available on Woods’ life and work. Alongside these instructive accounts of the artist is a plethora of images of works from across his varied career, serving to make
Tony Woods: Archive a hefty art book that you are happy to carry around with you.
Tucked away in a Fitzroy warehouse, and largely eschewing the machinery of commercial exhibition in recent years, Woods has fashioned a shielding anonymity within the recognised story of twentieth-century Australian art – whether he meant to or not. This book shines light on the career hidden within Woods’ warehouse archives, yet without the brashness or fanfare one might expect from a reveal-all exercise.
What immediately becomes clear on opening this book is the utterly diverse artistic practice embraced by Woods since he first began exhibiting in the early 1960s: from early landscape watercolours, to fauvistinspired figural paintings, to abstract prints, and, more recently, experimental moving image projects using super 8 film. And yet there are thematic threads which have been weaved across his career. Sheridan Palmer discusses the artist’s repeated examinations of the “structure of shadows” in one essay, as well as the interactions between “interior and exterior” spaces in a second essay.
Born in Hobart in 1940, Woods consolidated his explorative approach to the visual arts during a residency in New York from 1968 to 1970 funded through the coveted Harkness Fellowship. In the essays of this book we read tales of him living at the Chelsea Hotel and spending evenings at Max’s Kansas City bar; we also see the investigational paintings that issued from Woods either side of this residency. Here we find romance without sentiment, which is just what we want from such a narrative.
Tony Woods’ contributions to the visual landscape of Australian art over the last 50 years have touched upon a great many areas and niches, although without the recognition one might expect after having read this book. An accompanying DVD also introduces the reader to Woods’ video works, expanding still further their understanding of his experimental artistic nature.
Tony Woods: Archive is published by artinfo.com.au and is out now in all good bookstores. RRP $79.95
Images:
1. Methodical madness – Tony Woods
2. Same chair changed light situation – Tony Woods
3. Each soul has a prison – Tony Woods
4. Hangers – Tony Woods
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