BIO
Heléna Dupre Thompson is a visual artist and musician based in Portland, OR. Focusing on history and the detritus of contemporary civilization, her visual work challenges the foundational ideas of appeal. It centers around the spectacles that manifest, when human made objects and materials transform as a result of time, action, and forces of nature. Sometimes apocalyptic and sometimes optimistic, her images reflect the essence and history of the communities they represent.
Heléna’s upbringing in an industrial area of Providence RI, and career as a firefighter have had a great influence on her personally, and artistically. She spent her early years mostly focusing on music and touring the United States and Europe.
In 2002, she founded Purest Spiritual Pigs; an umbrella project that involves collaboration in multiple genres: music, performance art, visual art, and time-based art. This project has been featured on All Things Considered (MPR) and presented internationally in multiple publications. Heléna retired from the Minneapolis Fire Department in 2014 to pursue art full time.
In 2016 she founded Surveillant, a multidisciplinary event that involved thirty artists and occupied three buildings. Until recently, Surveillant was an annual art event during the PVDFest.
Since 2017 Heléna has focused predominantly on photography. She has been a guest lecturer at Pacific Northwest College Of Art and Portland State University School Of Art + Design. Her photography has been featured in publications including Yield Magazine (Snite Museum Of Art), Lenscratch and OneTwelve. She has been interviewed on Art Focus KBOO RADIO. Her work is in The City Of Portland Art Collection and she has exhibited her work throughout the US and internationally.