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Created by: Established, Cambridge-based fine artist John Tordoff
Medium: Mixed media. Acrylic and collaged newsprint.
Size: 50cm W x 46cm H NB - This painting comes with a 4cm box frame, which enables it to stand 4 cm out from the wall on which it hangs and are often completed immediately ahead of shipping.
The Story: One of John’s aims as a painter is to create drama. Not through narrative; he’s not in any sense trying to tell a story, but drama achieved through strong tonal contrasts. The placing of the strongest and brightest lights next to the darkest darks. Church interiors are full of these juxtapositions.
Created by: Established, Cambridge-based fine artist John Tordoff
Medium: Mixed media. Acrylic and collaged newsprint.
Size: 50cm W x 46cm H NB - This painting comes with a 4cm box frame, which enables it to stand 4 cm out from the wall on which it hangs and are often completed immediately ahead of shipping.
The Story: One of John’s aims as a painter is to create drama. Not through narrative; he’s not in any sense trying to tell a story, but drama achieved through strong tonal contrasts. The placing of the strongest and brightest lights next to the darkest darks. Church interiors are full of these juxtapositions.
Created by: Established, Cambridge-based fine artist John Tordoff
Medium: Mixed media. Acrylic and collaged newsprint.
Size: 50cm W x 46cm H NB - This painting comes with a 4cm box frame, which enables it to stand 4 cm out from the wall on which it hangs and are often completed immediately ahead of shipping.
The Story: One of John’s aims as a painter is to create drama. Not through narrative; he’s not in any sense trying to tell a story, but drama achieved through strong tonal contrasts. The placing of the strongest and brightest lights next to the darkest darks. Church interiors are full of these juxtapositions.
As a child it was John Tordoff’s father who taught him how to draw, though it was a talent that lay dormant for many years while I pursued a successful career as an actor. (For a fuller account of these times please see John’s entry on Wikipedia.
John was in his sixties, with acting opportunities on the wain, that as an outlet for his creative energies, he picked up the pencil again. Having moved to Cambridge in 2009, today he participates annually in Cambridge Open Studios and the city’s largest painting group, the Cambridge Drawing Society. More recently he has had work accepted by The Society of Wildlife Artists, the Pastel Society and the Royal Society of Marine Artists for shows at London’s Mall Gallery.
In 2021 John published ‘Working with Collage’, a fully illustrated guide to painting with mixed media.
Artist’s Statement:
”If Representation Art can be seen as a spectrum, where, working to the left we reach Abstraction and to the right it’s opposite, Ultra Realism, I would place myself somewhere in the middle, but with a marked sympathy toward the Abstract.
One of the ways I promote this bias toward the Abstract is through the use of collage. With it I’m creating an extra layer, one that the viewer is asked to engage with and decide what contribution it makes to the painting overall. My belief is, that the greater the involvement made by the viewer to understand the painter’s intention, the greater will be their final appreciation.”
