Silas Hobson
Brief Biography
Silas Hobson was born in May 1978. He comes from the Kuuku ‘Yau/Wuthathi language group. Silas Hobson is a naturally talented and gifted artist and was one of the original ART GANG members. He started painting in 1996 and over the years has established a solid mark as a leading Indigenous Australian artist from Lockhart River. Silas Hobson’s works capture his ancestral spirits and the link to culture, tradition, language, stories, and way of life both past and present. His paintings also capture the desires of the ancestral spirits and great elders of the past and present to preserving the life and values that have given identity to language and clan group in Lockhart River.
Silas Hobson has exhibited in both solo and group exhibitions in Hobart Tasmania, Cairns, Brisbane, Perth, Sydney, Darwin, Cape York Queensland, Warrnambool Victoria Melbourne, Canberra, Cooktown Queensland, Alice Springs Northern Territory, Melbourne, Spoletto Italy, Georgia USA, Houston Texas USA, Virginia USA, Brittany France and Santa Fe New Mexico USA.
From 3 June 2018 to 28 October 2018, Silas’s works will be exhibited in a permanent collection at Foundation Burkhardt-Felder et Culture Musee de l’art aboriegene australien “La grange” in Switzerland. The exhibition in Switzerland will include paintings from other Lockhart River artists, Rosella Namok, Irene Namok, Patrick Butcher and Fiona Omeenyo and is titled “Islands in the sea”.
Silas has attended group exhibition openings domestically within Australia and in USA and Japan. In May 2018, Silas will travel for the first time to Europe for the Switzerland Exhibition.
Artist Statement:
“We all have our different styles that speak about our traditional ways, stories and beliefs. I tell my story through prints and paintings. Our life here centres on our relationships with each other and with the land, the sea and the domestic and wildlife animals. My works are a contemporary response to the traditional culture and way of life in my home country”.
“A lot of my paintings are about people coming together, white people, black people, all kinds of people and even spirit people. Most of my works are about coming together, listening and yarning amongst each other, teaching, learning about each other, their way and our way and their culture and our culture”. I enjoy my art and I am happy that my art can go to places and homes where I know that I too have been welcomed through arts”. - Silas Hobson
Collection:
National Gallery of Australia, Art gallery of New South Wales, Queensland Institute of Technology Odgeroo Collection, Flinders University Collection, ATSIC Permanent Collection Canberra, Wollongong University Permanent Collection and Queensland Art Gallery; Foundation Burkhardt-Felder et Culture Musee de l’art aboriegene australien “La grange” in Switzerland.
