christian thompson:ritual intimacyExhibition Dates27 April – 8 July 2017

Opening FunctionThursday 27 April, 6-8pm

Monash University Museum of Art

Media Kit 1 / 4

MUMA | Monash University Museum of Art is proud to announce the first major survey exhibition of the work of Bidjara artist, Christian Thompson, one of Australia’s leading and most intriguing contemporary artists.

Thompson works across photography, video, sculpture, performance and sound, interweaving themes of identity, race and history with his lived experience. His work is held in the collections of major state and national art museums in Australia and internationally.

Thompson made history as one of the first two Aboriginal Australians to be accepted into the University of Oxford as a Charlie Perkins Scholar, where he completed his Doctorate of Philosophy (Fine Art) in 2016. Christian Thompson: Ritual Intimacy opens as the artist looks forward to the graduation ceremony in July, when he will be conferred his degree.

Featuring a major new commission created for this exhibition, Christian Thompson: Ritual Intimacy will survey Thompson’s diverse practice, spanning fifteen years, and will also

Ellip

se (f

rom

the

serie

s Po

lari)

201

4.

Christian Thompson: Ritual intimacy

be accompanied by the publication of the first monograph on the artist’s career and work, including essays by Brian Catling RA and Professor Dame Marina Warner DBE, CBE, FBA, FRSL.

The specially commissioned installation will be an ambitious multichannel composition, developing the sonic experimentation that is a signature of Thompson’s work. Incorporating Bidjara language, it will invite viewers into an immersive space of wall-to-wall imagery and sound:

“Bidjara is officially an endangered language but my work is motivated by the simple yet profound idea that if even one word of an endangered language is spoken it continues to be a living language,” Thompson says.

Christian Thompson: Ritual Intimacy explores the unique perspective and breadth of Thompson’s practice from the fashioning of identity through to his ongoing interest in Indigenous language as the expression of cultural survival.

Hann

ah's

Dia

ry (f

rom

the

serie

sLo

st T

oget

her)

200

9.

Monash University Museum of Art

Media Kit 2 / 4Christian Thompson: Ritual intimacy

The new multichannel work will develop musical ideas Thompson has previously explored.

“It will be a much more ambitious iteration of a song in Bidjara. At one stage I’m singing on one screen and then other versions of me appear singing the melodies.

I really see it as an opportunity to do something that’s more complex musically, more textured sonically – I also want it to be more intricate with my use of language,” the artist says.

Ritual Intimacy is curated by MUMA director Charlotte Day and guest curator Hetti Perkins.

Day explains that the exhibition is part of MUMA’s Australian artist series, which affords the opportunity to look at each artist’s practice in depth.

“Christian’s exhibition traces a particularly productive period of research and development, from early well-known works such as the Australian Graffiti series to more recent experiments with language in

sound and song works,” Day says.

A long-time curatorial collaborator with Thompson, Perkins is the writer and presenter of art + soul, the ABC’s acclaimed television series about contemporary Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander art. Thompson was accepted to Oxford University on an inaugural Charlie Perkins Scholarship, set up to honour Hetti Perkins’s famous father – a leader, activist and the first Aboriginal Australian to graduate from university.

Perkins says the MUMA exhibition is well-earned recognition for Thompson’s work, which she featured in the second series of art + soul.

“Christian has spent periods of his adult life, as a practicing artist, away from home, but there is a common thread in his work, and it’s this connection to home or Country,” Perkins says.

“In terms of the rituals or rites of the exhibition title, he is constantly reiterating that connection to home – through words, through performance, through his art, through ideas and

Untit

led

#6 (f

rom

the

serie

s Ki

ng B

illy) 2

010.

Monash University Museum of Art

Media Kit 3 / 4Christian Thompson: Ritual intimacy

writing,” she says.

Alongside performance and ritual, Thompson’s concept of “spiritual repatriation” is central to his work. Working with the Australian collection at famed ethnographic storehouse the Pitt Rivers Museum, Oxford, the artist was offered copies of colonial photographs of Aboriginal people but preferred not to work this way. Instead, he chose to spend significant periods of time with these ancestral images, absorbing their “aura” in order to then make his own artistic response that did not reproduce those original problematic images.

“At the heart of my practice,” Thompson says, “is a concern with aura: what it is, how it can be photographed and how it can be repatriated.”

Media contactDylan Rainforth, Senior Copywriter,Communications CollectiveE dylan@communicationscollective.com.auT +61 3 9988 2300M +61 403 538 354

MUMA | Monash University Museum of ArtGround Floor, Building FMonash University, Caulfield Campus900 Dandenong RoadCaulfield East VIC 3145 AustraliaTues – Fri 10am – 5pm; Sat 12 – 5pmFree Entrywww.muma.artmuma@monash.edu+61 3 9905 4217

Tour datesGriffith Artworks, Brisbane:20 July – 23 September, 2017UNSW Galleries, Sydney:4 May – 28 July, 2018

Oth

erin

g th

e Ex

plor

er, J

ames

Coo

k (fr

om th

e se

ries

Mus

eum

of O

ther

s) 2

016.

This project has been assisted by Creative Victoria and the Gordon Darling Foundation.

Monash University Museum of Art

Media Kit 4 / 4Christian Thompson: Ritual intimacy

Biography Christian Thompson Born 1978, Gawler, South Australia Lives and works between London and Melbourne

Dr Christian Thompson is a Bidjara contemporary artist whose work explores notions of identity, cultural hybridity, and history; often referring to the relationships between these concepts and the environment. Formally trained as a sculptor, Thompson’s multidisciplinary practice engages mediums such

as photography, video, sculpture, performance, and sound. His work focuses on the exploration of identity, sexuality, gender, race, and memory. In his live performances and conceptual anti-portraits he inhabits a range of personas achieved through handcrafted sculptures and carefully orchestrated poses and backdrops. In 2010 Thompson made history when he became one of the first two Aboriginal Australian to be admitted into the University of Oxford in its 900-year history. He holds a Doctorate of Philosophy (Fine Art),

Trinity College, University of Oxford, United Kingdom, a Master of Theatre, Amsterdam School of Arts, Das Arts, The Netherlands, a Master of Fine Art (Sculpture) RMIT University and Honours (Sculpture) RMIT University, Melbourne, Australia and a Bachelor of Fine Art from the University of Southern Queensland, Australia. In 2015 Thompson was mentored by pioneering artist Marina Abramovic during her In Residence at Kaldor Arts Project in Sydney, Australia, and continues to be a mentor to him. Thompson has exhibited widely, both nationally and internationally. His solo shows include: Museum of Others, Photo London Fair, London, Michael Reid Gallery, Berlin and Sydney, 2016; Collection+ Christian Thompson, Sherman Contemporary Art Foundation, Sydney, 2015; The Imperial Relic, Gallery Gabrielle Pizzi, Melbourne, 2015; Polari, Gallery Gabrielle Pizzi, Melbourne, 2014; Pagan Sun, Gallery Gabrielle Pizzi, Melbourne, 2013; We Bury Our Own, Gallery Gabrielle Pizzi, Melbourne, 2012; King Billy, Gallery Gabrielle Pizzi, Melbourne, 2011; Christian Thompson Survey Show, Gallery Gabrielle Pizzi, Melbourne, 2010; Heat,

Chalkhorse Gallery, Sydney, 2010; Lost Together, Gallery Gabrielle Pizzi, Melbourne, 2009; Australian Graffiti, Gallery Gabrielle Pizzi, Melbourne, 2008; The Sixth Mile, Chalkhorse Gallery, Sydney, 2007; The Sixth Mile, Centre for Contemporary Photography, Melbourne, 2006; The Gates of Tambo, Gallery Gabrielle Pizzi, Melbourne, 2004; Emotional Striptease, Gallery Gabrielle Pizzi, Melbourne, 2003; Show Me the Way to Go Home, George Adams Gallery, Melbourne, 2002; Blaks Palace, Gallery Gabrielle Pizzi, Melbourne, 2002; BIGIYI (Dream to Dream), Gallery Gabrielle Pizzi, Melbourne, 2002; and Gundang Ngaya Burbala, Australian Centre for Photography, Sydney, 2002.

Refu

ge (v

ideo

stil

l) 20

14

All images courtesy of the artist, Sarah Scout Presents, Melbourne, and Michael Reid, Sydney and Berlin.