Zipporah Thompson

Artist, Assistant Professor of Textiles, Georgia State University, Atlanta, GA

Education: 
Bachelor of Fine Arts in Fibers, UNC Charlotte (2008)
Master of Fine Arts in Textiles and Ceramics, University of Georgia (2015)

Hometown: Charlotte, NC

Zipporah Camille Thompson’s densely layered sculptures and installations beg to be touched. Fur, thread, hair, plastic, fabric, twigs and branches, bones, and carefully crafted ceramic pieces make up these richly tactile “primordial landscapes.”

“Foraging for materials around me, I am drawn to collecting and classifying fragments and objects and assembling them to recreate the whole,” Thompson says. Her evocative titles – The Hunter & The Gatherer, Relics & Remains, Homage, Womb to Tomb, Echoes of the Forest – bear witness to her effort “to restore the broken, to reconstruct narrative, to reconnect with the land, and to rekindle ties to the ancestors.”

It was as a student at UNC Charlotte that Zipporah discovered the expressive power of fiber art.

“My education at UNC Charlotte was very beneficial in that there was encouragement from faculty which facilitated creative freedom, especially from (Associate Professor) Mary Tuma. Mary was truly instrumental in sparking my interest in Fibers, as well as broadening my understanding of contemporary textiles. I enjoyed being exposed to many artists working in the same media, as well as learning of the many possibilities existing within the world of Fiber Art.”  

While completing her MFA at the Lamar Dodd School of Art at the University of Georgia, Zipporah has shown in solo and group exhibitions throughout Georgia and was recently awarded a distinguished fellowship, The Rogers Fellowship for Textile Arts, for study at The Hambidge Center, an artist community in the Georgia mountains.

“The art department at UNC Charlotte fully prepared me to continue on in my studies and in the pursuit of my art career,” she says.

Zipporah will participate in the Department of Art & Art History 2015 Biennial Alumni Exhibition. Learn more about her work at her website.