Coast/Coast
Todd B. Richmond

Coast/Coast is a solo exhibition of paintings by Todd B. Richmond, surveying recent work created in New York and in Los Angeles. From citrus farms in Southern California to the Queensboro Bridge in New York City, these large-scale works inhabit their inspirations. Richmond’s paintings are a contemporary visualization of the impact and influence his subjects illicit. In these works, Richmond incorporates unpainted primed canvas and raw linen to inform his palette as well as reveal the process and materiality of painting. The 2021 QbB Series features the steel cantilever over New York City’s East River as a compositional tool, using raw linen and oils and highlighting color pigments and materials that were available in 1909 when the bridge was built. In his Orchards and Crates Series, “Orange Diptych” evokes disappearing citrus farms depicted by the use of exposed unpainted canvas. “Avocado Crates” plays with form and the visual language of painting – a two-dimensional work created from a series of smaller paintings representing a pyramid of stacked “crates” painted with avocados that reveal what is contained inside. As in many of Richmond’s works, variations in color tone signal the passing of time while together with composition and structure create an experiential moment.

About the Artist 

Todd B. Richmond is an NYC-based artist whose creative practice includes painting, design, film, and sound, encompassing an ongoing conversation across mediums, drawing inspiration from nature, form, movement, and architecture. Richmond received his MFA in Fine Arts at Otis College of Art & Design, and California Institute of the Arts/CalArts MFA Graduate Program of Art & Technology; BA from City College of New York in Music & Audio Technology with Film Studies, where he was awarded The ASCAP Foundation Louis Dreyfus Warner/Chappell City College Scholarship honoring George and Ira Gershwin. As a visual artist, he was assistant to renowned artist Richard Artschwager from 1990-95 creating major works for museums and galleries worldwide. Richmond’s large-scale paintings and installations have been shown in New York City and Los Angeles including solo exhibitions at TOPAZ ARTS, NY, and in the group show I Remember…Remember? at Private Public Gallery in Hudson, NY. He has collaborated and exhibited with renowned artist Manuel Ocampo at Tyler Rollins Fine Art, NY; group exhibitions in NYC at Fountain Art Fair at the Armory, P.E.S. Limited in Midtown Manhattan; in CA at solo exhibitions at Bolsky Gallery; Los Angeles Municipal Art Gallery; Otis Open Studios; CalArts Grad Show, among others. Todd is Co-Founding Director of TOPAZ ARTS, Inc. – a nonprofit arts organization, which he founded with Paz Tanjuaquio in 2000, establishing a creative development center for contemporary performance and visual arts, located in Woodside, Queens, NY.

For more information about Todd B. Richmond, visit www.topazarts.org and follow him on Instagram.