Naomi Hobson (Southern Kaantju)
Rare | 2025 | Pigment print on archival cotton rag paper | 83 x 83cm
Sunshine Coast National Art Prize 2025 - Finalist
Image courtesy of the artist
Artist Statement
Naomi Hobson is a multidisciplinary artist working across painting, photography and ceramics. She resides on the banks of the Coen riverbeds in North Queensland, Cape York. This is where her grandparents were born, her mother’s traditional lands and sea. Home of the Southern Kaantju people. Naomi’s residence is an old tin shed that was once her village church. Her colourful abstract compositions act as a link between individuality and a shared identity. Her continual inspiration is the vast traditional lands of her ancestors surrounding the town of Coen in Queensland and her culture. Coen is a small township of 300 people at the bottom of the McIlwraith Ranges (part of the Great Dividing Range) surrounded by the east coast of Cape York Peninsula, rainforest and open wooded country, with many river systems that snake down to the northern section of the Great Barrier Reef. The local clans include Kaantju, Umpila, LamaLama, Ayapathu, Wik Mungkan and Olkola. This landscape has provided inspiration for Naomi’s art practice.