J. B. Thompson

J.B. Thompson "Photon" Mixed Media Etching w/ Copper and Aquatint c.1970s

Circa 1970

J.B. Thompson (1932 – 1984) began his career as an aspriring student of architecture. However, this endeavor soon gave way to a study of painting and sculpture. His mastery of the aforementioned three subjects was readily apparent in his early art. Later in life, he expanded into printmaking, which he synthesized with sculpture, creating sterling silver and copper collage prints, available only in limited edition and released in 1972. Throughout the 1970s, he continued to add various techniques and materials to his prints, including collograph, woodcut, lithograph, etching, carborundum surfaces and gold. The dramatic textural relief observable in his prints is a result of Thompson’s masterful manipulation of the carborundum process.

In terms of subject matter for the prints, he often used images which evoke the notion of a mental or physical voyage, generally with an overwhelming sense of movement. Others are based on metaphysical diagrams intended to represent various levels of the human psychic journey and the Earth’s physical cosmos. Thompson believed wholeheartedly in the one-to-one communication process that occured between viewer and artist and felt his audience would know a great deal about him if they grasped the meaning of his work.

Of his work it has been said that ‘the source of J.B. Thompson’s imagery was a direct, mystical experience of reality, which he did not try to define or control. He did not separate the creation of his art from the living of his life.’ Thompson rather successfully combined technical expertise with creative intuition. He died of cancer in 1984.