About

Overview:

David Hume is an Australian visual artist and photographer known for his exploration of complex themes such as identity, memory, and the natural world. His work spans multiple forms, including photography, painting, and mixed media, and is characterized by a thoughtful interplay between abstraction and representation. Hume’s practice engages with philosophical questions, often reflecting on the tension between reality and perception, while his aesthetic draws on both traditional and contemporary influences.
(expanded information may be found below)

Personal Information:

My life as an artist began in the 1980s when I’d finished my bachelor’s degree in Mathematical Physics but realised that it was art that would be my passion. It’s lead me through 20+ solo shows and many group exhibitions since then.

My work is largely concerned with representations of the Australian Landscape. It involves research and experimentation into new techniques and media to capture its unique beauty and for me to best express my own relationship and struggle in depicting this land we inhabit.

In 2022 I completed a Masters of Contemporary Art at UniSA, and in 2023 held a solo show for SALA 2023 at Praxis ArtSpace in Adelaide, the result of being awarded the inaugural SALA solo photographic opportunity. 

This website shows work since 2010, but if you feel like looking for in-depth or older information, you can also go over and poke around in the archive. There you will find a more complete list of old exhibitions, media and the like.

Please enjoy the site.

If you’d like to email me directly  my address is:
david “at” davidhume “dot” net  (hoping to trick spam robots)
Phone: 0418817243

David Hume: Brief Curriculum Vitae

Born:

1962, Adelaide, South Australia 

Education:

2021-22  Master of Design (Contemporary Art)
University of South Australia

1980-83  Bachelor of Science (Mathematical Physics, Pure Mathematics)
University of Adelaide

Selected Solo Exhibitions:

Recent Public Art Projects

2021-22:	Coast to Vines Rail Trail City of Onkaparinga
2021	Brown Hill Tree City of Mitcham Cumberland Park Photowall City of Mitcham

Recent Grants and Prizes:

2023	(Finalist) Advertiser Contemporary Art Award
2022	(Awarded) SALA Solo Photographic Opportunity
2021	(Awarded) Gavin Walkley Community Engagement Grant
2020:	(Awarded) Southern Ocean Art Prize – Creative Photography Category.

Collections:

Bankers Trust • Qantas • Walker’s Corporation • Australian Consulting Partners • Jones Lang la Salle • SAPMEA • SMS Consulting Partners • Pangaea Collection • Skinner Collection

Selected Bibliography:

The Adelaide Review May 2002 Visual Arts, Shimmer – John Neylon
Australian Art Collector Magazine no8 April 1999 Undiscovered, Unmasked – Susan McCulloch
The Melbourne Herald Sun 15 July 1998 Accidental Artist – Chris Boyd
The Melbourne Age 4 July 1998 Saturday Extra 
Optus Television, Peppermint Lounge Nov 1997 The Road to Andamooka 
Australian Artist Magazine, no.129 March 1995 Collision Course p.36-43

Expanded Information:

David Hume is an Australian visual artist and photographer known for his exploration of complex themes such as identity, memory, and the natural world. His work spans multiple forms, including photography, painting, and mixed media, and is characterized by a thoughtful interplay between abstraction and representation. Hume’s practice engages with philosophical questions, often reflecting on the tension between reality and perception, while his aesthetic draws on both traditional and contemporary influences.

Artistic Context and Influences

David Hume’s work is deeply rooted in the landscape and culture of Australia, but it also transcends local concerns, engaging with universal themes that resonate on a global scale. His artistic influences include modernist and postmodernist traditions, with a particular interest in abstraction, surrealism, and conceptual art. Hume’s work often evokes comparisons to artists such as Anselm Kiefer and Gerhard Richter in its layered, textural quality and its engagement with memory and history.

Hume’s background in both painting and photography allows him to blur the boundaries between these two mediums, creating images that are simultaneously representational and abstract. His photography, in particular, is not limited to a documentary or literal depiction of reality but instead seeks to uncover deeper, often hidden meanings in the landscape and human experience. In this way, Hume aligns himself with artists who view photography not merely as a tool for representation but as a medium for exploring the metaphysical and the existential.

Themes in Hume’s Work

1. The Natural World and Environmental Concerns

One of the central themes in Hume’s body of work is the natural world, particularly the Australian landscape. His photography frequently captures vast, desolate spaces, often focusing on arid and remote regions that evoke a sense of isolation and timelessness. These landscapes are not simply representations of physical spaces but serve as metaphors for the inner psychological and emotional landscapes of human experience. Hume’s work often explores the tension between nature and humanity, reflecting on how human presence alters the environment and how the environment, in turn, shapes human identity.

Hume’s engagement with environmental themes is not limited to aesthetic considerations. His work is also informed by a deep concern for ecological issues, particularly the effects of climate change and the destruction of natural habitats. His photographic series often depicts landscapes that bear the scars of human intervention, inviting viewers to reflect on the fragility of the natural world and the responsibility of individuals and societies to protect it.

2. Memory, Time, and History

Another significant theme in Hume’s work is the exploration of memory and its relationship to time and history. In many of his works, particularly in his photography, Hume captures images that seem suspended in time—moments frozen yet imbued with a sense of past and future. His use of texture, layering, and abstraction creates a dreamlike quality, evoking the ways in which memories are often fragmented, distorted, or elusive.

Hume’s photography often deals with the traces of history that linger in the landscape. His work meditates on the passage of time and the impermanence of human endeavour. The landscape becomes a repository of memory, holding within it the histories of both personal and collective experience.

This concern with memory also extends to Hume’s more abstract work, where layers of paint and texture suggest the accumulation of experience over time. These works invite viewers to engage not just with the surface of the image but with the deeper, hidden layers beneath, much as memory itself often reveals hidden truths when revisited and reexamined.

Photography as a Medium of Reflection

Hume’s photography stands out within the Australian contemporary art scene for its philosophical depth and its willingness to challenge the viewer’s perception. His images are often ambiguous, inviting multiple interpretations and resisting easy categorization. In this sense, Hume’s work aligns with broader trends in contemporary art that seek to blur the boundaries between the real and the imagined, the literal and the metaphorical.

His photographic process often involves a significant degree of manipulation, whether through digital editing, physical alteration of the prints, or the layering of different materials onto the photographic surface. This manipulation allows Hume to explore the limitations of photography as a medium for capturing reality, suggesting that all representations are, to some extent, constructions shaped by the artist’s subjective vision.

At the same time, Hume’s photography retains a strong connection to the physical world. His images are often grounded in real locations, and his attention to detail and composition reflects a deep respect for the medium’s documentary potential. This balance between abstraction and representation is one of the defining features of Hume’s work and speaks to his broader philosophical concerns with the nature of perception and the limits of human understanding.

Conclusion: David Hume’s Contribution to Contemporary Art

David Hume’s work strives for a unique position within contemporary Australian art, bridging the gap between photography and painting, abstraction and representation, personal and collective experience. His exploration of themes such as the natural world, memory, time, and identity places him in dialogue with both Australian and international artistic traditions, while his philosophical engagement with these themes ensures that his work resonates on a deeper, intellectual level.

Through his photography, Hume challenges viewers to reconsider their relationship to the world around them, asking them to look beyond surface appearances and engage with the hidden layers of meaning that underlie both the physical landscape and the human experience.

David Hume – Updated 20240920