NEIL HADDON
Broadly speaking, for me, art provides an opportunity to explore how self-identity intertwines with the exploration of cultural and historical narratives. It serves as a medium through which apply what I have learned through my migratory experience, blending personal biography with broader themes of displacement and identity.
This leads to a way of making art that embodies a fluidity of styles, reflecting an openness to diverse influences and willingness to experiment with different techniques. Ultimately, for me, art is a means of storytelling, but a kind of storytelling where the narrative arc shifts and jumps and pulls together multiple different threads.
My favourite art experience was… Favourite may not be the right way to express this. Most exquisite?… As a young man, feeling lonely, falling in love with a woman in a Velázquez painting in the Prado in Madrid, dead for over 350 years, then feeling even more alone but somehow comforted. 'Exquisite' might better express the depth of this encounter rather than 'favourite'
The artwork for this exhibition includes text and an image of a heart.
This text is a quotation from British writer HG Wells in 'The Happy Turning', published in 1945, the year before he died. In this short book, perhaps in anticipation of his death, he writes: "nothing a human heart has loved will ever be lost."
I first read Wells' War of the Worlds (1898) decades ago as a boy in a dusty school room back in England. The introductory pages of this book, set in the leafy green environs of my upbringing, mention Tasmania (where I now live) and the decimation of aboriginal peoples by invading Europeans. I understand Wells' sentiment, and I don't, in equal measure.
Biography
Neil Haddon is a British-Australian artist whose diverse body of work reflects his experience of migration and explores themes of displacement and identity. Drawing from his own biography and Tasmania's colonial history, Haddon employs a 'migratory aesthetics' characterized by a collage-like approach to painting.
Based in Tasmania since 1996, Haddon previously resided in Barcelona, Spain, where he exhibited regularly with leading commercial gallery, Galeria Carles Poy. His paintings, which range from hard-edge geometric abstraction to expressive figuration, have been showcased in over 100 exhibitions across Australia, Europe, and the USA.
Notable exhibitions include 'Theatre of the World' at the Museum of Old and New Art (MONA) and La Maison Rouge in Paris, as well as 'Strange Trees' at The Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery (TMAG), and 'Contemporary Encounters' at the National Gallery of Victoria (NGV), Melbourne.
Haddon's work is held in prestigious collections worldwide, including the NGV, TMAG, Devonport Regional Gallery, The Queen Victoria Museum and Art Gallery, The City of Whyalla Collection, and ArtBank, Sydney.
A recipient of numerous awards, including the Hadley Art Prize, the Glover Prize, the Whyalla Art Prize, and the Tidal Art Prize, Haddon's paintings have also been selected for esteemed national art prizes such as the Sulman and Wynne Prizes at the Art Gallery of New South Wales, and the Arthur Guy Memorial Prize at Bendigo Art Gallery.
Haddon holds a PhD from the University of Tasmania, where he serves as Associate Head of Art at the School of Creative Arts and Media and Coordinator of the Painting Studio.
@njhaddon