Andrea Thoma

Andrea Thoma is an artist/researcher and academic at the University of Leeds. Her practical and theoretical research is concerned with durational multiplicity and image perception in painting, photography and audio-visual installations. She considers the physicality of painting in relation to ideas of movement, colour and space. In her video and photographic work, she explores how our (inner) and also our technological processing of images is dependent on or correlated by our physical experience of the world through body.

As much as her paintings are concrete in their abstract materiality, she considers them as virtual possibilities, incorporating the potential of (moving) representational images — abstraction in relation to virtual figuration. Movement (or its absence) is a key element in her work, so is the idea of montage where diverse image-components or panels are juxtaposed within a visual method or across different media. She has exhibited in group and individual exhibitions in the UK, Europe and the US.

She has written on intermediality in the post-digital era, warfare and nomadic dwelling in contemporary moving image works, relations between sound and image, the cinematic in art, the fold as visual and conceptual paradigm and on participatory art and design research with marginalised youth. Her interest in intermediality has led to various international collaborations (Art) and participatory projects (Design and Art) with marginalised youth.

Contact Information

e-mail: [email protected] | [email protected]
website: https://andreathoma.com/
university profile: https://ahc.leeds.ac.uk/design/staff/483/dr-andrea-thoma
instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thoma.andrea.kunst

Qualifications

2013 PhD – Thought Dwellings: Time and Space in Painting, Photography and Video
1988 DNSEP Diplôme National Supérieur d'Expression Plastique (MA)

Professional Activities

Lecturer in Art and Design, School of Design, University of Leeds
Director of International Activities, School of Design, University of Leeds

External Examiner at UK and European institutions
Visiting Lecturer at various institutions in the UK, Europe and USA

2023 Research Mobility at the University of Sāo Paulo, SeeYouth Project
2017–2018 Research Mobility in Cape Town as part of the EU-funded PARTY project, involving designers and researchers from Europe, Namibia and South Africa with communities of marginalised youth

Selected Exhibitions

Individual / Two Person

2024 Colour Folds II: Movement between Minor and Major Modes, Space At Design, University of Leeds. https://youtu.be/8Gw-0EvEjrI?si=Ks68VeUIol097X-p

2022 Colour folds and other things: the painted, photographed and filmed, East Street Project Space, Leeds. https://youtu.be/p5Y3gsm4Obw?si=3Bcbeio_IUVtqNkj

2019 Textures of Place II, with Deborah Gardner, Inselgalerie, Berlin

2017 Textures of Place, with Deborah Gardner, Academy of Fine Arts, Lodz, Poland. https://cepra.leeds.ac.uk/past-projects/texture-of-place/

2016 Shifting Perspectives, with Joyce Lyon, Foyer Gallery, University of Leeds. Artist’s Book

2013 Thought Dwellings: In Situ, Lifton Place, Leeds

2012 Dialogue in Place II, with Joyce Lyon, Form and Content Gallery, Minneapolis

2010 Thought dwellings, Corridor Gallery, University of Leeds

2009 Twi_light, Katakomby Gallery, Brno, Czech Republic

2007 Provenienzen des Lichts, with Rosika Janko-Glage, Inselgalerie, Berlin

2003–2004 Skylight Stillnight, with Mara Zoltners, Jack Olson Gallery, Northern Illinois University, DeKalb, and Dean Clough Galleries, Halifax

2002 In the Sky, Otter Gallery, University College Chichester

2001 Sky Corridor, Arts Arena GaHenes, Leeds Central Library

2000 Dialogue in Place, Katherine Nash Gallery, Minneapolis, USA

1998 Andrea Thoma: Malerei und Zeichnungen, Zeitgalerie, Pforzheim, Germany

1995 Kulturhalle, Remchingen, Germany

1992 Between Continents, Dannenberg Gallery, New York

Group Exhibitions

2025 Larroque Arts Festival, France

2024

Leeds Summer Show
Beep Painting Biennial, Elysium Gallery, Swansea
Larroque Arts Festival, Larroque, France

2023 Made in Leeds, Northern Arts Centre, Leeds

2021

What comes after, 601 Artspace, NY
Drawing Dialogue III, curated by Gabriela Boiangiu, Keighly Creative Gallery

2019 Larroque Arts Festival, France

2018

Drawing Dialogue II, Kulturzentrum Katerini, Greece
Les anciens étudiants de l’école des Beaux Arts de Perpignan s’exposent, Le Boulou, France
Paint North, Ladybeck Space, Leeds

2017 Of Plants and Planets, collaborative project, In the Open exhibition, Sheffield

2014 Endlosschleife 2041, Württembergischer Kunstverein Stuttgart, Germany

2013 Curious, West Norwood Cemetery, London

2012 Close to Home, ESA Project Space, Leeds

2011 Sammlung EFAK – neue Schenkungen, Inselgalerie, Berlin

2010–2011 European Identities: Intercultural Dialogue, Inselgalerie Berlin, Textilemuseum Lodz (Poland), Palazzo Ducale (Urbania, Italy)

2008–2009 All Over The Place: Drawing Place, Drawing Space, University West of England, Bristol and Stanley & Audrey Burton Gallery, Leeds

2007–2008 So nahe, so fern / So near so far, APT Gallery, London, and Kunstverein Ebersberg, Germany

2007

Individualism, Bretton Hall
Five Years, London

2005 LAN2D Beyond Landscape?, Royal West of England Academy, Bristol, UK

Publications

2025

Between Now and Other Places: Intermedia Installations as Spatio-Temporal Facilitators of Affect, in A. Pethő (Ed.) Affective Intermediality. Palgrave Macmillan Cham
It’s not a fully sanded down chair, Artist’s Book (with L. Sumpton). Wild Pansy Press, Leeds

2024

Narrative Collage: The Use Of Media Images To Develop Filmic Stories With Young People In South African Townships, in B. Providência & G. Curcio (Eds.) Making Design through Communities: Reflections and Experiences in Different Contexts. Lab2PT, FAUUSP
Encounter as empowerment: a critical approach to participatory design research with marginalised youth (with P. Wilson & M.C. Loschavio dos Santos). Arcos Design, 17.2, 427–452. https://www.e-publicacoes.uerj.br/arcosdesign/article/view/81797/50717

2023 What is to hand: The fold as Landscape within textile imagination. Textile, 21.1, 363–383. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/14759756.2022.2122195

2020

Imaginary Landscapes, Artist’s Book. Wild Pansy Press, Leeds
Vertigo of presence: Chantal Akerman’s NOW, nomadic dwelling and the ‘war machine’ within the context of contemporary moving image works. Journal of Visual Art Practice, 19(2), 179–201. http://eprints.whiterose.ac.uk/151215/

2019 In-between Images: Where is the Ground? Acta Universitatis Sapientiae, Film and Media Studies, Vol. 17, Issue 1

2016

Blau – longing and the repetitions of (Deleuzian) becoming. The International Journal of the Image, 8(1)
Shifting Perspectives: Dialogue in Place Volume III, with J. Lyon. Essay by Iain Biggs. Bowker. ISBN 978-0-692-80083-6
Blau, Artist’s Book. Wild Pansy Press. ISBN 978 1 900687 59 1

2015 Discussing the Relationship between Sound and Image: The Scope of Audio/Visual Strategies in a Contemporary Art Context. International Journal of New Media, Technology, and the Arts, 10(3)

2014 The (Everyday) Image as One of Many: What Happens in the Interstice? The International Journal of the Image, 5

2012 The (Woven) Lining: Invisibility and Visibility in a Visual and Textual Exploration of the Cinematic in Art. Art South Africa, 11.2, 46–47

2011 Moving between Images. The International Journal of the Image, 1(1)

2009

The Conundrum of Medium Specificity. International Journal of the Arts in Society, 4(5), 523–534
Twi_light. Exhibition catalogue. Centre for Experimental Theatre, Brno. Essays by Jiri Havlicek and Andrea Thoma

2008 So near so far, with D. Gardner & J. Millar. Essay by Iain Biggs. Kunstverein Ebersberg e.V.

2007 Lichtlinien: Lines of Light. Essay by Karla Bilang. Berliner Fraueninitiative Xanthippe e.V.

2006 The Making of Place to Enable Memory. Journal of Visual Art Practice, 5(1+2), 83–93

2005 That which is near, with D. Gardner & A. Hauck. Essay by Dominique Lamy. PRESS Relations Schlick, Stuttgart

2003 Skylight Stillnight, with M. Zoltners. Essay by Lily Markiewicz. Dean Clough Galleries / Northern Illinois University

2000 Dialogue in Place, with J. Lyon. Essays by Iain Biggs & Monika Ochtrup. Bretton Hall College / University of Minnesota