February 7, 2023

The Language of Color: Private and Public Eudemonia

Event Series: A Bent but Beautiful World: Literature, Art, and the Environment

Showing the The Language of Color: Private and Public Eudemonia Video

Estelle Thompson is a British abstract painter who lives and works in London and Barbados. In this talk, she will look at her use of light and color in painting and built environment public commissions. As an artist, curator, educator, and designer, Thompson has always considered color as fundamental to all aspects of our lives. She celebrates its environmental function and positive power for humanity. She passionately explores color, form, space, and geography to extend the history of abstraction, optics, and contemporary aesthetics. She will also consider the overlap of studio practice research, so key to her large-scale public commissions, such as Milton Keynes Theatre, Quaglino’s restaurant in London, and various hospital and university buildings across the United Kingdom. Thompson will touch on artistic freedom and social responsibility, the nuts and bolts of commissioning, and the ethics of working as an artist both in the private or public sphere. She will also share how she spent two years living and working in Barbados during the COVID-19 pandemic, where the island’s location and environment further influenced her practice and philosophy.

Michael Scott, director of the Future of the Humanities Project, will provide opening and closing remarks, and Kathryn Temple, a Future of the Humanities Project senior fellow, will moderate a Q&A session following the presentation.

This event is sponsored by the Future of the Humanities Project; the Georgetown Humanities Initiative; the Georgetown Master's Program in the Engaged and Public HumanitiesCampion Hall, Oxford; and the Las Casas Institute (Blackfriars Hall, Oxford). It is part of the one-year-long series A Bent but Beautiful World: Literature, Art, and the Environment.

Image courtesy of the artist: Estelle Thompson, Green Flash 2020-2021 (detail), Oil on panel 41 x 31 cm.

Participants

Estelle Thompson

Estelle Thompson

Estelle Thompson is a British abstract painter who lives and works in London and Barbados. She has exhibited internationally, curated exhibitions in Europe and the Caribbean, and received commissions to incorporate color in the built environment of buildings across the United Kingdom. She is currently professor at the Slade School of Fine Art, University College London. Thompson’s studio practice centers on color, light, form, pictorial space, and geometry. Her works are held in major public collections including the Arts Council of Great Britain, the British Council, and the British Museum.

Kathryn Temple

Kathryn Temple

Kathryn Temple (moderator) is a professor in the Department of English at Georgetown University where she has taught since 1994. She specializes in the study of law and the humanities. Among her publications are Loving Justice: Legal Emotions in William Blackstone’s England (2019) and the co-edited Research Handbook on Law and Emotions (2021). Her humanities outreach activities include work with military veterans and the incarcerated.