Thompson, David E. (David Eugene), 1854-1942

David E. Thompson / Davi Det Hompson (1939-December 8, 1996) was a Richmond artist who exhibited widely in the United States and Europe. His work is included in the collections of the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts; the Kansas City Art Institute; the New Museum, Museum of Modern Art, and Franklin Furnace in New York City; the Los Angeles Institute of Contemporary Art; the Archive Sohm in Germany; and the Groninger Museum in the Netherlands. He is best known for creating book art, mail art, and text-based paintings based on the principles of the Fluxus and Dada movements. His pen name, Davi Det Hompson, illustrates Thompson's interest in manipulating the structure and meaning of the written word.

David Thompson was born in Sharon, PA. He received his Bachelor's degree from Anderson College in Indiana and his Master's of Fine Arts from Indiana University. He spent the last twenty years of his life as an active member of the Richmond arts community. He was a founding member of Richmond's 1708 East Main Street gallery, served on the Board of Directors of the Richmond Arts Council from 1983-86, and taught at Virginia Commonwealth University. In 1979, Thompson served on a volunteer committee that was instrumental in establishing the Book Art Collection in Special Collections and Archives at Virginia Commonwealth University's James Branch Cabell Library. He was married to Nancy Kunkle Thompson, a professor in Virginia Commonwealth University's Department of Crafts.