Where the Wild Things Are is a book that comes to mind immediately when you look at the work of
Todd Freeman. As a local artist in Grand Rapids, his copper etchings and sketches have been displayed at three solo exhibitions and four group exhibitions taking place across the country. This year, Todd has made a splash in both the local Grand Rapids art scene and nation-wide with the release of
Gather, a catalogue of intricate industrial nets drawn over the past two years. His work is currently being displayed at
Miscellany in Grand Rapids and the
Judith Racht Gallery in Harbert, MI. And, the guitarist of Red Hot Chili Peppers just bought half of his most recent drawings this past May. Freeman’s interest in meshing the past with the present, and the intense detail he lends to all his conceptions, places him among the "who’s who" of the art community.
Freeman has been drawing as long as he can remember, with science fiction and comic book characters being his mainstay through high school. “My love of detail and rendering lead to a start in the illustration program at Grand Valley State University,” says Freeman. “In 2001, I took my first printmaking course at GVSU and the possibilities, process and general character of
intaglio printing appealed to me in a pretty immediate way." After a few semesters, Freeman transitioned majors from illustration to printmaking. “I realized a switch to printmaking in the fine art department would allow more creative control and I finally felt like I was making something more my own,” comments Freeman.
Intaglio printing is an artistic technique where the artist incises an image onto a surface, known as the plate, and the incised line or area holds the ink. Freeman creates his masterpieces by etching lines directly onto copper plates, coating them in hardground. The hardground is heated up to form a rubber-like coating over the plate. Once Freeman creates an image with an etching needle, the plate will then goes into an acid bath. The acid bath eats away at any area that is exposed, creating his works of art. “I’ve always drawn tiny, meticulously rendered things, but the capabilities of copper etching were just so unlike any other way I’d ever worked before,” says Freeman. The actual prints are developed using what could be equated to printing press.
Like his artistic designs, Freeman is very detailed and selective in his choice of paper for the prints and hand-drawn sketches. “I’ve grown to hate the look of traditional drawing papers and I like how the personality of an aged paper reacts to an image drawn on it,” says Freeman. “In many drawings, I’ve been using a lot of old book pages and antique papers as dyeing or staining papers never seemed an option; they felt phony or forced to me.”
The etchings that Freeman has become known for are incredibly unique. Illustrative, yet diagram-like in their renderings, they make the unknown come to life and push you to think beyond the obvious and explore the realms of imaginative thought. “My prints draw their material from both the natural and supernatural kingdoms,” says Freeman. “They reference stories of alleged anomaly and legitimate marvels, and serve as inert swatches from the natural world.”
Freeman has always had an interest in the natural and supernatural worlds. As he developed a deeper understanding of the medium, he began to appreciate older print work. “I quickly found I was much more excited by the work artists were making two or three hundred years ago,” says Freeman. His detailed tendencies are derived from a variety of Flemish Prints, Persian miniatures and naturalists from many different eras. While many of Freeman’s prints are influenced by natural history, 18th and 19th century taxonomy prints, folklore and the paranormal, he is weary of going too far. “I never want my prints to feel overly whimsical or pushed into science-fiction or fantasy territory,” says Freeman. “I do as much as I can to ensure both a sense of believability and otherness.”
In 2009, Freeman participated in ArtPrize by collaborating with Meg Perec in drawing an intricately detailed giant squid entitled, “60 Ft. Ghost.” “It took us five weeks to draw the squid together on two 30 ft. sections of paper,” recalls Freeman. “It’s the largest drawing I’ve ever attempted.” When asked if he would compete in ArtPrize again, he said, “I don’t think I would enter again. I enjoy the energy ArtPrize brings to town, but it’s a bit too overwhelming for me. Other than the '60 ft. Ghost,' my work has typically been on a smaller scale, which is hard to pitch against the big blockbuster type works the competition tends to favor.”
With or without ArtPrize, Freeman’s work has been getting some critical acclaim. In 2011, he participated in a group exhibition at
Gallery Hijinks in San Francisco. “The art community there is incredibly vibrant and diverse,” says Freeman. “The Bay Area has probably my absolute favorite combination of scenery, climate and culture of anywhere I’ve visited.”
Beyond copper etchings, Freeman also creates intricate line drawings in Moleskin sketch books.
Gather, released in May 2012, represents one of those ventures. “The artwork in
Gather is stripped of a narrative or story. The drawings represent formal objects that were interesting to create. Together, they became a family of related pieces,” says Freeman. Through the distribution efforts of
Issue Press, the zine has been picked up in cities such as New York and Chicago. “I’ve been extremely flattered by how well it has been received,” says Freeman. “From a business perspective, it has also been satisfying to create something that is accessible to everyone, but still meets my aesthetic needs.”
New works from Todd Freeman are currently being displayed at the Miscellany Gallery downtown, and he is also preparing to debut some new pieces at an upcoming exhibit called "Wildlands." The exhibit is being held at the
Ames School of Art in Illinois and opens September 6. “'Wildlands' is going to be a collection of old and new work from the past year. Some pieces are about twice the size of any I’ve done previously,” says Freeman. This exhibit plans to take on a more man-made or manufactured presence and will showcase some new prints focusing on what Freeman calls “inventive cartography.”
“Printmaking has such as direct, deep tradition with both documentative and narrative work, and it has allowed me to tell the kinds of stories I’ve always loved,” concludes Freeman. “The nature of the medium is so time consuming that you have to make every move count -- there is a lot of planning involved. It’s essential to me that all parts of the etching or drawing work together to deliver something that’s close to what I had in my head.”
You can visit Todd Freeman online
here.
Chelsea Slocum is a resident of Grand Rapids. She works as an educator and enjoys learning about new and different things happening in the city. Follow her on twitter @cslocum.
Photography by
Adam Bird