Christian Thompson

Biography

Born 1978 in Gawler, South Australia, Christian Bumbarra Thompson is a contemporary artist who has presented his photographs, videos and performance work in numerous solo and group exhibitions nationally and internationally. Thompson's recent group exhibitions include; Tell Me Tell Me, Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney, Australia; Encounters: The next 500 Years, Plugin Centre for Contemporary Art, Winnipeg, Canada; Solos, Modern Art Oxford, Oxford, United Kingdom, 2011. The Beauty of Distance/Songs of Survival in a Precarious Age, 17th Biennale of Sydney, Australia; Culture Warriors, National Indigenous Art Triennial, Washington D.C., U.S.A; Hybrid Arts Fest Australia, Radialsystem V, Berlin, Germany; Andy and Oz: Parallel Visions, Andy Warhol Museum, U.S.A; Brilliance, Aboriginal Art Museum, Utrecht, The Netherlands; Cultural Warriors, National Indigenous Triennial, National Gallery of Australia, Canberra; and Raised by Wolves, Art Gallery of Western Australia, Perth. He was a Studio Artist at the Gertrude Street Contemporary Art Spaces 2006-2008, Melbourne.

He has completed a highly coveted international residency at DasArts Advanced Studies for Performing Arts, Amsterdam and subsequently undertook a residency and public art project with the Center for Future Art Research at Arizona State University, Arizona USA. In 2010, he completed two residencies, one at Blast Theory, Brighton, UK and the other at Green Street Studio, New York, USA from December to March. And finally, also in 2010, he was awarded the inaugural Charlie Perkins Scholarship for post-graduate studies and has commenced his Doctorate of Philosophy in Fine Art at Oxford University, UK. Thompson is the first Aboriginal Australian to be accepted into Oxford University

For more information, visit Christian Thompson's website here

Artist Statement

This new series, King Billy, is an ode to his great great grandfather, King Billy of Bonnie Doon Lorne. The initial inspiration was a photograph of King Billy, standing alone wearing his 'name plate'. Despite its colonial overtones, for Thompson, this image of the senior tribesman exudes wisdom and kindness and reminds him of his father. In much of Thompson's work his processes are intuitive, he delves into a rich dream world and draws out fabulous images. He manifests his own mythological world. In this series his figures are clad in fabrics patterned with Indigenous motifs, mainly cheap hoodies in lurid colours; a modern/ ancient skin for a magic youth culture. He has made a triptych, three views of a pink hooded figure spewing cascading pearl stands from the face; opulent, decadent, excessive and sensual.

Another image shows a crowned figure swathed in fabrics bearing the markings of various clans, perhaps indicating the domain of this regal form. In the hands a (poisoned?) chalice - the sawn off plastic bottle a warning about petrol sniffing? His self-portrait as psychedelic godhead/ Carnaby Street dandy/flower child is spectacular and arresting. He is wearing a tailored suit, patterned with more Indigenous motifs and he cradles a bouquet. His skin is green and his eyes are purple flowers. What can this otherworldly creature tell us?

Thompson seems to emphasise a theme of disparity in this work; the 'hoodie' with the cascading pearls, the crown with the plastic bottle, the opulence with the desperate. These works are both beautiful and confronting.