Peace of Material

Peace of Material is one of three capstone pieces from The Key Collection by Daren Todd, released at Art Larger Than Me Studios in Portland Oregon in Summer 2022. Based around the iconography of an everyday key, Daren has taken the shapely building blocks of an item and broken them down into three dozen works of art in various forms and sizes, each complete with a pair, or a set, or a through line, kind of like a set of brightly colored, abstract geometric Matryoshka dolls.

One of triptych capstone, "Peace of Material" holds both the names of the following nine medium pieces in the collection, but also graphically contains the building blocks and color palette for the entire collection. Based around a period of supporting a loved one through grief, the Key Collection explores heavy themes of loss, questioning and sadness, while also balancing the uncertainties of life with the joyous things that we do know: life can be good and there are beautiful moments every single day. With some peace of mind, some peace with your working materials, and some peace in the space around you, creatively, almost anything can happen.