< > Faith Thompson Nelson - Stone Country: 2 July – 1 August 2009 AT Charlotte Street, London
Faith Thompson was born in Darwin in 1971. Her mother, Maureen Marvrangulu is a renowned artist from Ngukurr in the Gulf of Carpentaria, while through her father Thompson is related to several of the great desert-artists of Utopia, the aboriginal community near Alice Springs.
Despite being educated in the urban centres of Darwin and Cairns, Faith Thompson has retained a passionate feeling for the country of Ngukurr, where she now lives with her mother and family. It is the great subject of her work and her life.
To spend time there with her is an extraordinary experience; and it is an experience that is enshrined in her art. She creates panoramic paintings of the familiar landscape, with its magnificent rock escarpments, rivers and wet lands. They combine a grand sense of observation – like that of a bird flying over the scene – with a feeling almost of being inside that land itself.
Despite being educated in the urban centres of Darwin and Cairns, Faith Thompson has retained a passionate feeling for the country of Ngukurr, where she now lives with her mother and family. It is the great subject of her work and her life.
To spend time there with her is an extraordinary experience; and it is an experience that is enshrined in her art. She creates panoramic paintings of the familiar landscape, with its magnificent rock escarpments, rivers and wet lands. They combine a grand sense of observation – like that of a bird flying over the scene – with a feeling almost of being inside that land itself.