Born in Calgary, Alberta, he studies at the Provincial Institute of Technology and Art, Calgary, under Illingworth Kerr and others: at the university of Saskatchewan Workshops under Barnett Newman and John Ferren. He worked as a television artist at Lethbridge and as a newon sign designer in Lethbridge and Calgary and won a second price in an international neon sign designing competition in 1960.
One of the Regina Five group of painters, Ted Godwin is known for his Tartan Series, Dying Orchids Series, and large landscapes that explore the interactions of the river-edge. He held his first one man show in Calgary at the Allied Art Centre in 1958 and a second at the Norman Mackenzie Art Gallery, Regina, in 1960. It was not until his joint exhibit with the “Five Painters from Regina” that his work became known to a wider audience. This exhibition was organized by Richard Simmins who was then Chief of the Exhibition Extension Service of the National Gallery of Canada, who noted of the artist, “His rich kaleidoscopic canvases vigorously brushed into existence, depend in many instances upon delightful colour relationships which appear to the casual observer as miraculous accidents.”
Godwin's other showings have been at: Stratford Shakespearean Festival Exhibition, Stratford, Ontario (1962); “Three From Regina” at the Dorothy Cameron Gallery, Toronto (1962); two man show at the Blue Barn Gallery, Ottawa (1962); two man show at Gallery XII, Montreal Museum of Fine Arts (1962); Winnipeg Biennial (1964); and the 3rd, 4th, and 6th Biennials of Canadian Art. He worked in Greece on a Canada Council Scholarship 1962-3. He is represented in the following collections: Norman Mackenzie Art Gallery; National Gallery of Canada; Art Gallery of Ontario; Agnes Etherington Art Centre; Guelph Agricultural College; Canadian Industries Limited (Montreal) and the School of Architecture, University of Manitoba. He taught at the University of Saskatchewan School of Art, Regina and was elected to the Royal Canadian Academy in 1974.
Source: "A Dictionary of Canadian Artists, Volume I: A-F", compiled by Colin S. MacDonald, Canadian Paperbacks Publishing Ltd, Ottawa, 1977
