About the work

For a number of years around the turn of the Millenium I was engaged in a multi-part project thinking about revolution, particularly the intersection of English and Scottish thinkers with the French Revolutionary period of the 1790s. This portrait of Thomas Paine – who lived in Paris at that time, and helped write a constitution before losing favor and being imprisoned – is part of a print series that collected portraits of ten individuals, in an edition of ten. There are only two complete sets left, plus an Artist’s Proof, along with a number of singeltons, of which this is one.

About the artist

Thomas Lawson is an artist with a diverse, project-driven output that encompasses painting, writing, editing, curating and teaching. He has been showing paintings and developing temporary public works internationally since the late 70s. In the spring of 2009 selections of older work were included in historical survey shows of the 80s at the Metropolitan Museum in New York and Magasin in Grenoble. His essays have appeared in Artforum and other art journals, as well as many exhibition catalogues. From 1979 until 1992 he, along with Susan Morgan, published and edited REAL LIFE Magazine. From 2002 until 2009 he was co-editor of Afterall Journal. In 2010 he launched East of Borneo an online magazine and archive. He was one of three selectors of the British Art Show in 1995, and has curated numerous exhibitions in New York and Los Angeles.. He served as Dean of the Art School at CalArts from 1991 until 2021. He has received support from the Guggenheim Foundation and the NEA. A book of selected writings, Mining for Gold, was published by JRP-Ringier, Zurich in 2004. An anthology of REAL LIFE Magazine, was published by Primary Information, New York in 2007.