Find new ways to play the old song. In a medium as commonplace as traditional color landscape photography, this is now the challenge. For 25 years, John Todaro has been searching for images that are capable of being more than merely decorative. On one level or another, his goal with each image is to find a way to startle the viewer. In landscape photography, particularly in color, this often  means finding images of profound simplicity or eventfulness. 

Todaro's critically acclaimed work has won numerous awards, including five first place awards from The Art League of Long Island.  He has also won recent first place awards from The New Jersey Center For The Visual Arts, The Montauk Artist's Association  and the Westhampton Beach Outdoor Art Show. His work has been exhibited extensively and hangs in many corporate and private collections, and his published works are available world-wide.

John's images have been appeared in The New Yorker, Men's Journal, Town And Country, Decor, Metropolitan Home, Crain's New York Business, Elle Canada and other magazines. In addition, recent articles about John Todaro have appeared in The East Hampton Star, The Southampton Press, Newsday, Shutterbug and Blue Sand. John was selected as a VIP artist in 2007 by Long Island Pulse. There was a 2008 article on John's work in Hamptons Online and John has also recently appeared on Plum TV."

“My interest in photography began in Northport, NY, in 1975. I signed up for one of Anthony Nobile’s legendary black and white workshops. My teacher had been a student of Minor White’s, and was a photographer with work in major collections. He also was an unorthodox instructor, and, for several years, became an important  early influence. During the next five years, while working for the National Park Service, I continued photographing in black and white.

In the winter of 1980, while living on Fire Island, I began experimenting with color film. Color photography was finally getting a little serious attention in those years. In a way, it may have been the first major paradigm shift in photography since Walker Evans. Interestingly, color photography in the 70's seemed to be drawing more inspiration from Evans himself, than from Ansel Adams or anyone else. I think it was the peculiarly non-cerebral approach of Evans, whose work turned the tables on the tradition of fine printing. Over the next few years, I began to see my work change from photographs that were concerned with textures and contrast, to images that were often simply organized with color. A curious and somewhat surreal sense of place began to express itself. My pictures were getting less majestic, less busy and coming together now in new and unexpected ways. In addition to lonely local beaches, I found myself drawn to other unsung places like North Dakota, the Florida panhandle and West Texas. 

Since 1987, when I moved to East Hampton, it has been the pursuit of this simplicity and ‘place’ in my work, which has occupied me thoroughly.” 

“A photograph is a secret about a secret. The more it tells you, the less you know”.  - Diane Arbus

“Whether he is an artist or not, the photographer is a joyous sensualist, for the simple reason that the eye traffics in feelings, not in thoughts”. - Walker Evans