LEON SADUBIN

Leon Sadubin has had a significant impact on furniture design and making in Australia. Since 1976 he has participated actively in the craft movement and initiated an exhibition in 1978 which led to the formation of the Woodworkers Association of NSW of which he is an Honorary Life Member. He was awarded a Churchill Fellowship in 1982 which took him to Denmark to study the organization of furniture workshops and to Germany to study woodcarving with a master carver. A number of his works are included in the collection of the Powerhouse Museum, Sydney, the New Parliament House, Canberra and numerous private collections. He has regularly taught furniture design at Australian Universities and has given many presentations to woodworkers associations and interest groups.

Leon Sadubin's workshop was situated from 1977 to 1999 at Thornleigh in Sydney’s northern outskirts. From 1999 to 2011 his home and workshop was located at Woodhill, on the escarpment between Berry and Kangaroo Valley on the NSW South Coast. In 2012 Leon and his wife Ginny moved their home to nearby coastal Gerringong, also establishing a new workshop in the township. Leon specializes in commissions for both public spaces as well as domestic projects. He has collaborated with a number of other craftsmen and artists to produce distinctive pieces of furniture which display a mastery of materials well beyond wood. Another side of his practice includes sculpture which gives scope to expressive, figurative and kinetic forms in wood and copper. Leon's drawing skills are used extensively in the development and presentation of commission work.

image by susan sluys