Samantha Hobson Paintings

Samantha Hobson uses the broad sweeps of paint typical of the young generation of artists from Lockhart River, to create images of Country and the elements of nature in the tropics. One of her subjects is the burning-off season on Cape York. The annual ritual of burning-off all of the rich undergrowth after the wet season is crucial to good all-year hunting and to the safety of this remote community.

Two weeks into the dry season, the undergrowth becomes tinder for big fires. Samantha captures both the danger and spectacle of this dangerous task in her extraordinary, vivid and perceptive images of the fires racing along he pristine beaches and leaping into the azure skies of far north Queensland.

In her early years, the artist painted images of abstraction representing the violence and dysfunction of her remote community. The fire paintings, though literal, also engage as a metaphor regarding the cataclysmic effects of violence in the community on the edge of paradise, an issue the artist feels committed to expose. She says: “When I started… I painted stuff that was happening to me… some things were very bad … I didn’t want to hide it … I wanted to tell people what was happening to me and other young girls in my community. I wanted to show my feelings and my hurt … they were hard, violent paintings … most of them showed the bruises and the blood.”

“I wanted the paintings to say to people in my community ‘You don’t treat young girls like that … they got the right to their life.’ I wanted to tell every person in my community that I’d had enough. I sent these paintings out for Exhibitions … people need to know what’s happening. If you hide it away … no-one knows there’s a problem … so how can they fix it?”

Samantha Hobson has used her art to engage a wide audience and bring the stories of her tropical homelands to the world. She continues to build on the unique stories that her art presents.

Solo Exhibitions

2006  Land to Sea, Andrew Baker Art Dealer, Brisbane
2005  From My Country … Land and Sea, Vivien Anderson Gallery, Melbourne
2004  Yuma Kuyi Pi’l (Fire and Water), Vivien Anderson Gallery, Melbourne
2003  Kalmaa-na Waympa Wimpa (From the bush to the sand beach)’, Andrew Baker Art Dealer, Brisbane
2003  Lanthalantha (Fire), Vivien Anderson Gallery, Melbourne
2002  Yuku Untana (Fuel for the Fire), Vivien Anderson Gallery, Melbourne
2001  ‘ee be right b’um bye’, Vivien Anderson Gallery, Melbourne
2000  From the Top, Andrew Baker Art Dealer, Brisbane

Selected Group Exhibitions

2008  Women’s Law, Japingka Gallery, Fremantle WA
2006  Unchartered Territory, October Gallery, London, England
2006  Histoires de Terre et Mer: Peintures Aborigènes de Lockhart River, Australie, Chambre de Commerce et    d’Industrie du Morbihan, Lorient, France
2006  Cairns NAIDOC Exhibition: shifting tides, moving sands, Tanks Art Centre, Cairns
2005  Cairns NAIDOC Exhibition: Contemporary Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders Art and Crafts from Tropical North Queensland Tanks Art Centre, Cairns
2004  Colour Power: Aboriginal Art post 1994, National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne
2004  Lockhart River Artists, Hogarth Galleries, Sydney
2004  Divas of the Desert, Gallery Gondwana, Alice Springs
2003  Story Place: Indigenous Art of Cape York and the Rainforest, Queensland Art Gallery, Brisbane
2003  Beneath the Monsoon: Visions North of Capricorn, Artspace Mackay, Cairns Regional Gallery, Perc Tucker Regional Gallery, Townsville
2003  Water: Prints from Lockhart River and the Tiwi Islands, Queensland University of Technology Art Museum, Brisbane
2003  Artworks from FNQ + Torres Strait Islands, Artworkers Alliance, Brisbane
2003  The Women’s Show, Vivien Anderson Gallery, Melbourne
2003  Ngaachi Ngampula (Our Country), Hogarth Galleries, Sydney
2003  Lockhart River Gang, Gallery Gondwana, Alice Springs
2002  Lines II, Fire-Works Gallery, Brisbane
2002  Inaugural exhibition, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Gallery, Ian Potter Museum of Australian Art, National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne
2001  Dreamtime: Zeitgenossische Aboriginal Art/The Dark and The Light: Austria
2000  Lockhart River Print Exhibition, Cairns Regional Gallery Parma Belong Sandbeach: Painting and prints by Lockhart River Art Gang; Queensland Aboriginal Creations, Brisbane
1999  Message Stick, touring exhibition of the Lockhart River Art Gang, funded by Visions Australia
International Works on Paper Fair, Sydney
1999  Lockhart River Art Gang Exhibition, Aboriginal Creations, Brisbane

Awards

2001 Second Prize; Painting, Laura Festival, Queensland
Second prize; works on paper, Laura Festival, Queensland

Collections

National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne
Cairns Regional Gallery
Queensland Art Gallery, Brisbane
The Nahum Collection, London
Private collections USA, Singapore, Malaysia and Australia
1998  Message Stick, Queensland Aboriginal Creations, Brisbane