Hugh Edwards

As a designer Hugh has had an outstanding design career within the advertising industry, and also managing his own practice for many years. His work in Queensland dates back to the design of the corporate identity and mascot Matilda for the 1982 Commonwealth Games, through Expo88 and beyond.

The awards he has received over some forty years of consistent excellence in commercial practice speak for themselves, but it is an educator that he has made an outstanding contribution to the colleges, as well as the design community. This work has included the preparation of course curriculum for QCA. In addition, Hugh has worked tirelessly, and often thanklessly, with BAD Club for many years, and contributed significantly to AGDA. He is in the BAD Half of Fame.

Hugh has always been enormously admired for his selfless approach to his professional life. Within a few months of Hugh’s withdrawal from commercial design practice at Creative Plantation, he produced a painted portrait of former Greens leader Bob Brown. The picture is most complex in design and execution, for as well as the subject, it features over one hundred images of Australian endangered species. Hugh consulted with Bob Brown to receive endorsement of all to be included, and Bob Brown commented on the thoroughness of Hugh’s research and the reference gathered. A mammoth project.

Hugh entered this picture into the Archibald Prize last year [2017]. The portrait did not make the final, BUT was hung in the “Salon des Refusés”, at the S H Ervin Gallery, Sydney. An extraordinary piece of creative design achievement, in this case a recognised work of the world of fine art, and completed as his first project away from the commercial arena.