Photography by Melika Davies
Tom Christophersen – Thanataphobia
by Brigid Hansen
Nostalgia works in peculiar ways. In acts of self-preservation, we often grab ahold of the familiar and preserve it for safekeeping. Hindsight dismantles and reshapes significant memories through collaging these with new learning – a process both unnerving and comforting. In his first solo exhibition, Tom Christophersen presents two concurrent approaches to combating his fears -to strive for perfection or simply, to succumb to death.
Entering the space we encounter fuchsia walls upon which 7 polished, lyrically rendered conceptual portraits hang. These are the result of a number of staged portrait sessions in which the artist constructed re-imaginings of significant life events. Collectively, these works possess an unsettling kind of power. ‘Hamraiserbuilds’ on the visual tradition of the Australian Gothic, constructing a portrait in which the tattooed sitter is adorned with a flesh mitre. Usually worn by Archbishops and members of the clergy, the mitre here represents the repression and homophobia embedded in Adelaide’s notorious Family Murders. The work re-examines through a contemporary queer lens the sense of dread, fear and repression experienced by a young Christophersen as he learned of these killings as a young gay boy in Adelaide.
In another of the 7 standout portraits, ‘Mitcham Shops Are Burning Down’, Christophersen queers an homage to Adelaide’s iconic Mitcham Square fiberglass whale named “Squirt”. Squirt serves as one of these bizarre yet treasured pieces of shopping center infrastructure that litter the suburbs -a forever memory vacuum and a place where he played as a child and returned as a teen to fool around. By adorning himself in Squirt’s clown-like, Bowery-esque ball mask, Christophersen creates a mesmerising and humorous self-portrait laden with references to the self and his place in the world. The combination of these 7 works together in their polished, showroom style collectivity are a process and a product -both a proud declaration of queerness and liberation from fear and a morose, perfectionist approach to death.
Contrary to this refined, concept-laden approach, the funereal viewing room at the rear is a darker look into the artist’s fears, where he demonstrates purposeful vulnerability in showcasing unfinished portraits of close friends. Alongside these watercolour and pencil portraits and beneath a pink curtain is a video installation made in collaboration with Peter Mooney, Patrick Howard, Sophie Haylen, Tim Kemp and Lisa Walker. Performing a holy-sexy striptease in bright white back light in blindfold, garter and nipple cover, the work plays on an infinite loopto a soundtrack of monotonous, stream-of-consciousness quotes:
“The time we talked about excessive foreskins and you ruined Monte Carlo biscuits for me forever”
”Howling the words to eternal flame in the driving rain”
”Amyl on the bus”
”The time you climbed into a front-loader washing machine in Broken Hill”
Taken from a Facebook poll orchestrated by the artist, the above quotations are a selection of fond memories Tom’s friends have had with him. They have a distinctly camp quality, conjuring scenes of youthful abandon and embarrassment, carelessness, self-destruction. They encapsulate the feeling of fear, dread, and existential wonderment at learning how the world works when you’re a teenager. Listening to Tori Amos, getting sick and staying home alone pretending you don’t still like watching cartoons. When positioned together with the self-portrait figure, Christophersen depicts the sense of tension and discrepancy between his inner-critic and others’ honest perceptions of him -his productivity, his charisma, his artistic prowess. Christophersen’s orchestration of a funeral for his anxious, thanatophobic self is a confrontation of the thing he fears most. Hell is confronted in order to be destroyed.
This mournful yet celebratory collection of works powerfully speaks to the difficulty of comprehending the reality of death. Christopersen’s body of work provides not an antidote to but a conversation around death and our compulsion to leave a legacy when we go.
Brigid is a writer and curator living and working on Wurundjeri land (Melbourne)
Thanatophobia – a solo exhibition by Tom Christophersen
Opening Night Thursday 28th November from 6-8pm @ The Stockroom Gallery, 355A Wellington St Clifton Hill
Exhibition ran from 28th November – 8th December
Opening night photography by Laura Du Ve + Creative
