ARTIST BIO
ARTIST BIO
TOM O'CONNOR IS A CONTEMPORARY AUSTRALIAN ARTIST, ACTOR AND CREATIVE DIRECTOR WHO LIVES AND WORKS IN LOS ANGELES. HIS ARTIST PRACTICE SPANS ACROSS ABSTRACT PAINTING, SPATIAL INSTALLATION, SCULPTURE TO SELF-PORTRAIT PHOTOGRAPHY.
O’Connor is an emotional artist who is driven by his need to create and express. HIs paintings construct depictions of his personal experiences and internal desires, often recalling moments of falling in love to the thrills of attraction and connection; they’re figments of nostalgia and daydreams of the future. These human stories and inner feelings manifest in gestural and emotive strokes.
Growing up between the beach and the city in sub-tropical Queensland strongly influenced his sensibility as an artist. His vivid use of color and expressive forms are a nostalgic marker of his early life. Recently featured by prominent global arts and fashion magazines including ODDA and SICKY, O’Connor has begun carving out a voice in the international art and culture scene.
His process is always kinetic, mining for instruction from his heart and body “Music has the ability to get me out of my head and into my body and this is where ultimately I want to paint and create from” O’Connor is often dancing and moving in-between strokes. “I want people to feel something, I want them to dance too.”
O’Connor's high school art assignments at the conservative all boys catholic school he attended would often take over entire classrooms and would be as much about the visual work as the reaction. “For senior year I turned my entire classroom and everyone in it into a thundering storm with swaths of black and grey tulle covering the entire ceiling and projections of lighting strikes bouncing off mirrors around the room. I wanted to see how people reacted, how it made them feel”
Suspended in a Daydream 2023. 60x72, Acrylic and Epoxy Resin on Canvas