Charles Thomson (born 6 February 1953) is an English artist, poet and photographer. In the early 1980s he was a member of The Medway Poets. In 1999 he named and co-founded the Stuckists art movement with Billy Childish. He has curated Stuckist shows, organised demonstrations against the Turner Prize, run an art gallery, stood for parliament and reported Charles Saatchi to the OFT. He is frequently quoted in the media as an opponent of conceptual art. He was briefly married to artist Stella Vine.
Charles Thomson was born in Romford, Essex, and educated at Brentwood School, Essex, where he was a classmate of Douglas Adams. While still at school, he organised mixed media arts events and contributed to Broadsheet, a magazine edited by Paul Neil Milne Johnstone and published by Artsphere, a school arts group.[1] Outside school, he started the Havering Arts Lab. this resulted in a headline "Sex Orgy Tale—Group Banned" in the local Havering Express newspaper. In 1970 he produced a satirical magazine, called 'Lubricant', which ran for 10 issues. In 1971 he stood (unsuccessfully) as a Dwarf candidate in the Havering council elections, and was involved in anti-pollution protests. He distributed "underground" magazines around London, including "Schoolkids OZ". In 1975 he went to Maidstone College of Art, where he was the only person in ten years to fail the painting degree. 1979–87 he worked part-time as a telephonist and receptionist at Kent County Ophthalmic and Aural Hospital. 1987–99 he was a full-time poet, with work in over 100 anthologies.[2]
Sexton Ming, Tracey Emin, Charles Thomson, Billy Childish and musician Russell Wilkinson at the Rochester Adult Education Centre 11 December 1987 to record The Medway Poets LP
In 1979, Thomson was a founder member of The Medway Poets, a punk performance group, who read in pubs, as well as the Kent Literature Festival and the 1981 international Cambridge Poetry Festival. There were, however, personality clashes in the group, particularly between Billy Childish and Thomson, who said, "There was friction between us, especially when he started heckling my poetry reading and I threatened to ban him from a forthcoming TV documentary."[3] However, a TV South documentary on the group in 1982 brought them to a wider regional audience. According to Childish: "Me & Charles were at war from 1979 until 1999. He even threatened having bouncers on the doors of Medway poet’s readings to keep me out."[4]
Thomson has said this period was "an incredibly pressured and creative time and established the basis on which we are still working."[5] Other members included future Stuckist artists Bill Lewis and Sexton Ming. Tracey Emin, then a local student, was on the outskirts of the group, being the girlfriend of Billy Childish. In 1987 Thomson printed her first book of writing, Turkish Tales, which had been edited by Lewis and was published by Childish.[6]
In 1999 Thomson was reconciled with Childish and together they founded the Stuckists art group with eleven other artists. Thomson coined the name "Stuckism" after an insult from Tracey Emin to ex-boyfriend Childish that he was "stuck", which Childish had recorded in a 1993 poem. The group stated its aims as promoting figurative painting and opposing conceptual art, being particularly critical of the Turner Prize and Charles Saatchi's promotion of Britart. Childish left the group in 2001 and Thomson remained as the figurehead, gaining extensive media coverage for his activities and outspoken views. In the meantime the Stuckists grew to a worldwide movement of over 100 groups in 30 countries.
From 2000 to 2005 he staged yearly Stuckist demonstrations against the Turner Prize (making use of props such as clown costumes and blow-up sex dolls). He stood in the 2001 United Kingdom general election, as a Stuckist candidate against the then-Culture Secretary, Chris Smith. The same year he exhibited the then-unknown artist, Stella Vine (later made famous by Charles Saatchi). The couple married in New York and separated after two months.
Thomson opened the Stuckism International Gallery in Shoreditch (2002–2005). In 2004 he reported Saatchi to the OFT (Office of Fair Trading) for alleged unfair trading practices in the art world: the complaint was not upheld. He co-curated the Stuckists' first major exhibition in a public gallery, The Stuckists Punk Victorian show at the Walker Art Gallery, for the 2004 Liverpool Biennial. In 2005 he offered of a donation of 175 paintings by Stuckists artists from the Walker Gallery show to the Tate Gallery: this was rejected by the trustees. Later that year he obtained, under the Freedom of Information Act, Tate Gallery minutes about the purchase of a trustee Chris Ofili's work The Upper Room. This led to an ongoing press controversy about the purchase[7] and resulted in an official investigation by the Charity Commission, who censured the Tate in July 2006 for acting outside its legal powers.[8]
In June 2006 he wrote to the British Prime Minister Tony Blair asking him to intervene in the case of Stuckist artist Michael Dickinson, who was facing a possible 3-year jail sentence in Turkey for exhibiting a satirical collage of the Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.[9][10]
In October 2006, Thomson exhibited paintings and presented an academic paper in both the Triumph of Stuckism exhibition and symposium respectively . Both these events were organised by Naive John for the 2006 Liverpool Biennial at the invitation of Professor Colin Fallows, Chair of Contextual Studies at Liverpool School of Art and Design.
He writes a regular arts column for 3:AM Magazine, which carries work by a number of Stuckists, ex-Stuckists and their opponents.
Stella Vine
Left to right: Stephen Howarth, friend, Charles Thomson and Stella Vine at the Vote Stuckist show in 2001, where Vine exhibited her work publicly for the first time.
Charles Thomson was briefly married in 2001 to artist Stella Vine. She met Thomson[12] on 30 May 2001 at the private view of the Vote Stuckist show in Brixton, where she accepted his invitation to form The Westminster Stuckists group and to exhibit some of her paintings publicly for the first time in the show.[11] On 10 July, she renamed her group The Unstuckists.[13]
Thomson and Vine had a two-month relationship and they married on 8 August 2001 in New York.[14] The next day, Vine said she wanted a divorce; they had an intense row.[15] She left him and they did not meet again until a week later.[16] Vine said she could not cope with his controlling behaviour.[15] The marriage ended in 2001 after about two months.[17][18] They were granted a divorce in October 2003.[19]
In February 2004, after Vine "rose to fame after being championed by Charles Saatchi",[20] Thomson said that he was pleased that she had got success, but it was he and the Stuckists, not Saatchi, who had "discovered" Vine.[21] Vine said that Stuckism was a misogynistic cult,[19] that she had quickly realised that the marriage and the Stuckist group were not right for her,[22] and that her marriage to Thomson was "an utter disaster".[22] During the relationship Thomson had paid off Vine's debts of £20,000,[15] and Vine said she married him because this had been a condition of his funding her:[15] "I couldn't face stripping any more and it was too bloody good to turn down."[15] Thomson said that they had a business arrangement to promote themselves as an art couple, there was no condition of marriage, and that she was "really selling herself short" by saying that was her motivation.[23]
In March 2004, Vine said that she had only seen Thomson once, in an art shop, in the previous two years.[15] She later told The Times that it was "impossible to explain"[24] why she married Thomson, that he didn't "give a s*** about art or the Stuckist movement",[24] and that he saw her as a means of gaining his own publicity: "When I met him and he saw some of my history, he saw dollar signs. He is a very exploitative man."[24] In June 2007, Vine said that the marriage was consummated in 2001, a few weeks after the ceremony—"I owed him that"[12]—and Thomson then paid off her debts of £20,000, after which "I've never seen him again."[12]
On 28 March 2004, Thomson reported Saatchi to the Office of Fair Trading (OFT) for alleged breaches of the Competition Act and cited as an example Saatchi's promotion of Vine, a situation which made the row "more bitter".[25] The OFT said they did not "have reasonable grounds to suspect that Charles Saatchi is in a dominant position in any relevant market", which Thomson said was "just another cruel smack in the face" for Saatchi.[26] In September 2004, Vine threatened suicide if her work was included in The Stuckists Punk Victorian show at the Liverpool Biennial, and the owner of the painting withdrew it.[27]
Strip Club
In October 2006, The Stuckists held a group show, Go West, at Spectrum London gallery, including two of Thomson's paintings, Stripper and Strip Club, "explicit images of his ex-wife."[28] Thomson said the works would make Vine "pissed off",[29] but that she had painted images that were far more upsetting for people,[29] that he would prefer her to enjoy them as he did her art[30] and that they were painted as a catharsis not as an attack.[29] Vine said she had no comment.[29]
In July 2007, at the same time as the opening of Vine's major solo show at Modern Art Oxford, Thomson, furious[31] at Vine's refusal to acknowledge her debt to the Stuckists,[31] held a rival Stuckist show at the A Gallery in Wimbledon, I Won't Have Sex with You as Long as We're Married, which Vine apparently said to him on their wedding night.[31]
In September, Thomson wrote in The Jackdaw, criticising the Tate gallery for not having work by a number of figurative painters, among whom he listed Vine,[32] and said she should have been one of that year's Turner Prize nominees for her show at Modern Art Oxford.[33]
Sir Nicholas Serota Makes an Acquisitions Decision
Thomson has painted what must be the masterpiece of Stuckism so far: Sir Nicholas Serota Makes an Acquisitions Decision. Here the slick handling and smartass irony of Britart are turned on its champion to make a very funny point and a rather good portrait. This is an example of what the Situationists called detournement, using your enemies' own weapons against him.[34]
However, Sarah Kent (a staunch advocate of Britart) was less impressed with the satire: "One might forgive his puerile humour if Thomson didn't consider it a serious weapon ... cut the ranting and Thomson could be a reasonable painter."[35]
Thomson pointed out in response, "it's reality. A few weeks after I did the painting, Tracey Emin was shown on TV getting very angry about an installation because someone had substituted another pair of knickers for hers ... That makes it a bit sad."[36]
In October 2006, Thomson's painting of Serota was exhibited during the Stuckists' Go West show at Spectrum London gallery in London. It was suggested that this could be seen as revenge for the Tate's rejection of a Stuckist donation of 175 paintings the previous year.[37]
Art technique
I Feel Bad When I Reject Your Love
Thomson typically paints figuratively with black outlines and areas of flat colour, often brightly coloured. The painting, I Feel Bad When I Reject Your Love is not typical in this respect. He said:
Based on something a (now ex) girlfriend said to me. I thought it was a negative picture, but then I realised it was positive because it’s a reconciliation after self-knowledge. It’s also ambiguous as to who’s speaking. Most of my paintings are based on experiences with people I know, usually on a drawing from life, but in this case from a photo I took of her.[2]
The paintings are based on spontaneous line drawings with a black wax crayon in a sketchbook. These are enlarged on the canvas. The colour is usually the first one on the canvas, though mixing it can take up to an hour. He likens colour to feeling and concludes, "The final image is a synthesis of material, emotional and spiritual experience."[2]
Gallery
Everyone Called Smith in the Barnet Phone Book 1998–1999
Woman in New York (Stella Vine Honeymoon 2001)
A Single Woman in London is Never More than Six Inches Away from the Nearest Rat
Stuckism is an international art movement founded in 1999 by Billy Childish and Charles Thomson to promote figurative painting as opposed to conceptual art. By May 2017, the initial group of 13 British artists had expanded to 236 groups in 52 countries.
Remodernism is an artistic and philosophical movement aimed at reviving aspects of modernism, particularly in its early form, in a manner that both follows after and contrasts against postmodernism. The movement was initiated in 2000 by stuckists Billy Childish and Charles Thomson, with a manifesto, Remodernism in an attempt to introduce a period of new "spirituality" into art, culture and society to replace postmodernism, which they said was cynical and spiritually bankrupt. In 2002, a remodernism art show in Albuquerque was accompanied by an essay from University of California, Berkeley art professor, Kevin Radley. Adherents of remodernism advocate it as a forward and radical, not reactionary, impetus.
Stella Vine is an English artist, who lives and works in London. Her work is figurative painting, with subjects drawn from personal life, as well as from rock stars, royalty, and other celebrities.
Philip Absolon is a British artist and a founder member of the Stuckists art group, exhibiting in the group shows, including The Stuckists Punk Victorian at the Walker Art Gallery in 2004, and taking part in Stuckist demonstrations against the Turner Prize. He has had long-term unemployment problems, depicted in his work with imagery of skeletons; his other main subject is cats, which he studies and depicts in motion.
Joe Machine is an English artist, poet and writer. He is a founding member of the Stuckists art group.
Paul Arthur Harvey is a British musician and Stuckist artist, whose work was used to promote the Stuckists' 2004 show at the Liverpool Biennial. His paintings draw on pop art and the work of Alphonse Mucha, and often depict celebrities, including Madonna.
Jesse Beau Richards is a painter, filmmaker and photographer from New Haven, Connecticut and was affiliated with the international movement Stuckism. He has been described as "one of the most provocative names in American underground culture," and "the father of remodernist cinema."
The Stuckists Punk Victorian was the first national gallery exhibition of Stuckist art. It was held at the Walker Art Gallery and Lady Lever Art Gallery in Liverpool from 18 September 2004 to 20 February 2005 and was part of the 2004 Liverpool Biennial.
Eamon Everall is an English artist and educator. He was one of the 12 founder members of the Stuckists art group. He paints in a "neo-cubist" style, with subjects from life worked on over a long period.
John Bourne is a British artist and painter, living and working in Wales, and a member of the Stuckists art movement. He founded the Wrexham Stuckists group in 2001 and has been exhibited in the group's shows since then, including The Stuckists Punk Victorian. He has also taken part in Stuckist demonstrations against the Turner Prize. The subject matter for his paintings, which are done in a simplified style, comes from his memories.
Elsa Dax is a French painter and a member of the Stuckists art movement. Major themes in her work are myth, legend and fairytale.
Stuckism is an art movement that began in London, England, in 1999. In 2000, Melbourne artist Regan Tamanui started the first international branch of the movement. As of 2010, there are seven Australian Stuckist groups, who have held shows—sometimes concurrently with UK activities—received coverage in the Australian press and on TV, and also been represented in UK shows. The Stuckists take a strong pro-painting and anti-conceptual art stance, and were co-founded by Charles Thomson and Billy Childish.
Mark D, born Mark Randall, is a British punk musician. He is also associated with the Stuckist group of artists. Mark D was born and spent his childhood in Peterborough. He now lives in Nottingham.
Stuckist demonstrations since 2000 have been a key part of the Stuckist art group's activities and have succeeded in giving them a high-profile both in Britain and abroad. Their primary agenda is the promotion of figurative painting and opposition to conceptual art.
Regan Tamanui is an artist based in Melbourne, Australia. In October 2000, he founded the Melbourne Stuckists, the fourth Stuckist of the original Stuckist groups and the first outside the United Kingdom. He has also painted prolifically as a street artist under the tag name HA-HA.
Go West is the title of the first exhibition by Stuckist artists in a commercial London West End gallery. It was staged in Spectrum London gallery in October 2006. The show attracted media interest for its location, for the use of a painting satirising Sir Nicholas Serota, Director of the Tate gallery, and for two paintings of a stripper by Charles Thomson based on his former wife, artist Stella Vine.
Abby Jackson is a British artist, Stuckist painter, writer and art activist.
Sir Nicholas Serota Makes an Acquisitions Decision is one of the paintings that was made as a part of the Stuckism art movement, and is recognized as a "signature piece" for the movement. It was painted in 2000 by the Stuckism co-founder Charles Thomson, and has been exhibited in a number of shows since, as well as being featured on placards during Stuckist demonstrations against the Turner Prize.
The Stuckism International Gallery was the gallery of the Stuckist art movement. It was open from 2002 to 2005 in Shoreditch, and was run by Charles Thomson, the co-founder of Stuckism. It was launched by a procession carrying a coffin marked "The death of conceptual art" to the neighbouring White Cube gallery.
The A Gallery was a contemporary art gallery in Wimbledon, London run by Fraser Kee Scott.
References
↑ Broadsheet, n.d., edited Paul Johnstone, Artsphere
↑ Thomson, Charles (August 2004), "A Stuckist on Stuckism: Charles Saatchi and the OFT attack", from: Ed. Frank Milner (2004), The Stuckists Punk Victorian, p. 23, National Museums Liverpool, ISBN1-902700-27-9. Available online at stuckism.com.
↑ Pia, Simon. "Now the Stuckists are on the move", The Scotsman, p. 22, 22 September 2004.
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