SCHENECTADY – Duane Todman appeared to be on the verge of realizing his dream of making his mark as an accomplished painter who also dabbled in other art forms.
Todman, a familiar face at the Electric City Barn, had recently won a scholarship to study next year at the Academy of Realist Art Boston, according to Kristen Holler, executive director of the Electric City Barn and the Albany Barn, spaces where artists can work on perfecting their craft.
Holler said she received an email Wednesday from the school’s assistant director, who in that correspondence said she had personally interviewed Todman, and that they “were so excited to have such a talented and passionate artist join their program.”
Todman, 27, will never get to celebrate getting into the premier art school.
That's because he was shot in the neck around 9 p.m. Saturday while sitting on steps of a church at the corner of Craig and Stanley Streets not far from where he worked and lived in the city’s Hamilton Hill. Todman was taken to the hospital where he died.
Police are continuing their probe into his death. A city police spokesman did not return a call Wednesday seeking details about the crime.
The killing Saturday was the second in four days for a city that has only had two gun-related homicides in the past two years.
They come at time when Mayor Gary McCarthy has threatened to lay off upwards of 40 police officers to help bridge a projected $11.5 million budget hole as a result of decline revenues because of the coronavirus.
He’s hoping that Schenectady will receive federal monies to help soften the financial hit and avert layoffs to police, firefighters and other City Hall employees.
Holler said she first met Todman when he interviewed for a residency at the Albany Barn, where he lived for about two years before moving to Schenectady last year.
She said he immediately showed up at the Electric City Barn and soon become a daily presence while honing his craft.
Todman, who lived for a time in New Jersey, was a total fan of classical renaissance painters and a deep thinker, said Holler.
“He did a lot of portrait painting, he was an oil painter predominantly, but did a lot of classical still life,” she said.
She said the Albany Barn Facebook page features a still life painting on the facility’s mezzanine that Todman was working on and that he was planning to showcase his paintings at an exhibition in November.
Some of his recent work included a self-portrait and one of local activist Wil Rivas, who runs the C.O.C.O.A House, a neighborhood non-profit group that offers program for youngsters.
Holler said Todman’s sister, a photographer and makeup artist, used to work out of the Albany Barn. She and with his brother and mother also live in the area, Holler said.
“He was just so eager to connect with people, he just really wanted to talk about art with people, so he just gravitated toward other creative people,” said Holler.
She said Todman also loved talking about religion, was working on a book and screenplay, and had also put out some tunes on SoundCloud, a German-based online audio distribution platform and music sharing website.
Charlie Sweeney recalled Todman as an “old soul” who he had a wide-ranging deeply profound conversation with the first time they met at the Albany Barn some years ago. Sweeney, a writer, musician and film maker, is an artist in residence there.
Sweeney said Todman went to great lengths to make sure Sweeney got a copy of a drawing and sketching technique Todman got from one of his mentors.
"He said 'I have to keep the book itself because it's got some spiritual energy to it, this book is like my Holy Grail,'' said Sweeney. "What he did was make copies of every page, and there was like 200 pages in this book, he photocopied it, he hole-bunched it and he bound it together with shoelaces, and gave it to me."
Sweeney said Schenectady and the art world lost a good man.
“He was incredibly well schooled in all the major painting schools going back to the Renaissance with a particular love for Caravaggio,” said Sweeney. "He was an amazing dude and he was a super-talented artist." Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio was an Italian painter active in Rome for most of his artistic life, according to information online.
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