Teddy Ridgeway is a printmaker and painter living in Santa Cruz, California.
For many years he worked as a scenic artist in Los Angeles, designing and painting large scale backdrops for television and cinema, touring musicians, and theater productions. He has painted numerous murals for clients throughout the state.
Before that, he studied at the Aegean Center for Fine Arts in Greece, where he learned traditional oil painting techniques and practiced monotype printmaking.
His imagery is inspired by the animate spirit that is threaded through the landscape of his home, is expressed in cycles of growth and decay, in the shapes that natural objects take, and the relationships between the seen and the sensed.
He looks to myth and folklore stories as an initial reference point to give form to explorations of the themes of connection, transformation, love, loss, and wonder.
His monotype process combines stencil shapes and textured layers which, in collaboration with the printing press, bring unexpected elements to each piece, becoming part of the mystery of their creation.