Lloyd Godman
b.(1952)

"Lloyd Godman's twin careers of serious and successful organic gardener and practicing artist of great creative energy converge in new and constantly surprising ways to make art about the ecological concerns that underly his gardening. Over almost three decades his art has widened out from relatively traditional landscape photography to include elements of performance, audience participation art and multimedia installation to explore the tensions between electronic consumer society and the ecosystem."

Artlink magazine - Ecology: Everyone's Business - Vol 25 no 4 - Dec - Jan 2006


It is doubtful if Australasia has a more protean, visionary and ecologically committed artist than Lloyd Godman. Born in Dunedin, New Zealand in1952, and now living in Melbourne, Australia, he has been exploring environmental issues through photography (in combination with sculpture, painting and installations) since the early1980s. He began taking more or less traditional landscape pictures in the late 1960s, but exposure to iconoclastic artists like Man Ray, Kurt Schwitters, and Joseph Beuys inspired him to begin chipping at the edges of photography in the interest of breaking down boundaries.

 Black and White magazine USA issue 57 2008


"Probably the artists who have influenced me the most are Man Ray and Max Ernst, - not so much the work itself but their inquisitive nature where they kept exploring things. I see my work as a means of learning about myself and my relationship to the universe. As both are in flux, my work is also in constant change. So rather than establish a constant and marketable style each series presents a new challenge where I can carry over some artifacts from my past experience and add another new layer."

The energy of light is magic. The magic of light in all its manifestations and meanings is at the critical edge of my work. Light is essential to both photography and photosynthesis, a fusion of the two is a most special spell.

Lloyd Godman 2005


Lloyd has an MFA from RMIT University Melbourne (1999) and has had over 45 solo exhibitions and been included in more than 250 group exhibitions. He established and was head of the photo section at the School of Art Otago Polytechnic New Zealand for 20 years before moving to Melbourne.