- 29
Joanne Tod b. 1953
Description
- Joanne Tod
- Leitmotiv
- signed, titled and dated 1986 on the reverse
a diptych, oil on canvas
- (left) 168 by 206.8 cm. (right) 66 by 96 cm.
- 66 by 81½ in.; 26 by 37¾ in.
Provenance
Carmen Lamanna Gallery, Toronto
Private Collection, Toronto
Catalogue Note
Tod's large, and often enigmatic, paintings from the 1980s were among the most compelling and masterful expressions of their time. The ambition she showed was matched by the technical virtuosity she was able to muster for canvases of this scale and complexity, but most of all by the uncanny ability she had to imagine images that many people found both stimulating and unnerving.
Like other comparable works of hers, this one poses a number of questions or conundrums that are both provocative and unanswerable. Like any strong art, however, these unsettling images (in this case so cleverly juxtaposed and connected with a shaft of light as if from the angel of the annunciation), make us ask ourselves about race, religion and art. Who are these people? What are they doing? What are they thinking about? How are they connected? What has the museum to do with a modest church? What is the artist trying to tell us?
According to the artist:
The subject of this diptych is the transcendental nature of the spiritual. Leitmotiv refers to a recurring theme, in this case a formal visual device - a transparent beam of light - that appears in both panels of the diptych.