Elizabeth Thompson (painter)


Elizabeth Thompson is an American painter whose works have been described by writer and art historian Bonnie Clearwater as "a call to action for the reclamation of Paradise". She has painted the Florida Everglades as "de-peopled visions of a primordial Eden." Thompson lives in Florida and New York City.

Early life and education

Thompson grew up in Englewood Cliffs New Jersey. Thompson received a BA from Mount Holyoke College and graduated Magna Cum Laude in 1975. Pratt Institute awarded her a BFA in 1977. She attended the Ecole des Beaux Arts in Paris from 1976-77.

Career

Thompson began her career by winning a competition to paint 135 oil storage tanks on the New Jersey side of the Hudson River. She then went to Paris and had her first exhibit on the Rue Seine in 1978. She has an extensive list of site specific murals that were commissioned by corporations and collectors. She also painted series that include subjects such as Paris monuments and sphinxes, swimming pools at night, African landscapes, the Everglades and impending environmental events. Bruce Helander, in the introduction to the book that accompanied her exhibition at the Coral Springs Museum of Art, says "Thompson's a visual storyteller whose canvases are filled with plot-twists." Thompson has had 17 solo exhibitions and has participated in 16 group exhibitions. She cocurrated an exhibition "Pools" that toured gallery and museum venues worldwide, including at a Gallery in Moscow, Russia in 1989.This exhibition was the first independent show in a nongovernment gallery in Moscow since 1917. At an exhibition of her Africa paintings, some visitors commented that the landscapes reminded them of the Everglades. After floating through a tunnel of Mangroves, she was hooked. Critic Jon Thomasson wrote of her palette, "you discover shades of green you didn't know existed".

Style

Thompson uses both the traditional method of oil and canvas, but beginning in 2017 began experimenting with acrylics on unprimed canvas. She paints on the floor and allows the "accidents" created by pouring paint directly on the canvas dictate the eventual subject and composition of the work.

Personal life

Thompson married Richard Thompson in 1978 and was widowed in 2006. She now lives with her partner, Guerrino De Luca. She has two daughters, Victoria Thompson and Antonia Thompson Weisman.

Solo exhibitions