Cheyney Thompson American, b. 1975

Cheyney Thompson is a conceptual artist whose work probes the mechanics of painting—how it’s produced, distributed, and perceived. Thompson employs rule-based systems—from mathematical formulas and algorithms to colour notation systems and even economic models, to remove subjective gestures and foreground the conditions of creation.

His notable Chronochromes (2009–2011) translate the Munsell colour model into time-based visual systems: each day features a complementary hue pair whose lightness shifts hour by hour—turning black at midnight—while saturation varies monthly. What seems like vibrant abstraction is actually a material record of labor, time, and systemic control.

Later series such as Quantity Paintings (2015–17) deploy random-walk algorithms to distribute pigment intuitively, and in Displacement and Intervals, Thompson maps historic masterworks or custom-coded systems onto grids, then disrupts them with machine-like precision—quantifying each brushstroke and mapping labor onto the canvas's surface.