Hunt Slonem
Inspired by nature and his 60 pet birds, Hunt Slonem is renowned for his distinct neo-expressionist style. He is best known for his series of bunnies, butterflies and tropical birds, as well as his large-scale sculptures and restorations of forgotten historic homes. Slonem’s works can be found in the permanent collections of 250 museums around the world, including the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City, the Whitney, the Miro Foundation and the New Orleans Museum of Art. Since his first solo show at the Fischbach Gallery in 1977, Slonem’s work has been showcased internationally hundreds of times.
His flair and admiration for far-flung destinations has been a staple of his life since childhood. Slonem was born in 1951 in Kittery, Maine, and his father’s position as a Navy officer meant the family moved often during Hunt’s formative years, including extended stays in Hawaii, California and Connecticut. He would continue to seek out travel opportunities throughout his young-adult years, studying abroad in Nicaragua and Mexico; these eye-opening experiences imbued him with an appreciation for tropical landscapes that would influence his unique style.
After graduating with a degree in painting and art history from Tulane University in New Orleans, Slonem spent several years in the early 1970s living in Manhattan. It wasn’t until Janet Fish offered him her studio for the summer of 1975 that Slonem was able to fully immerse himself in his work. His pieces began getting exhibited around New York, propelling his reputation and thrusting him into the city’s explosive contemporary arts scene. He received several prestigious grants, including from Montreal’s Elizabeth Greenshields Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, and the Cultural Counsel Foundation’s Artist Project, for which he painted an 80-foot mural of the World Trade Center in the late 1970s. He also received an introduction to the Marlborough Gallery, which would represent him for 18 years.
As Slonem honed his aesthetic, his work began appearing in unique, contextual spaces. By 1995 he finished a massive six-by-86-foot mural of birds, which shoots across the walls of the Bryant Park Grill Restaurant in New York City. His charity work has resulted dozens of partnerships, including a wallpaper of his famous bunnies designed specifically with Lee Jofa for the Ronald McDonald House in Long Island.
Slonem continues to draw great inspiration from history, forging palpable connections to the past through his art. His popular portraits of Abraham Lincoln reframe the historic figure as a pop-art icon, and he is currently working on a nine-foot-tall bronze sculpture of French explorer Robert De La Salle, to be displayed publicly in Louisiana.
Yet Slonem’s most ambitious project has been his mission to save America’s often forgotten historic buildings. Realizing too many of the country’s architectural gems have fallen into disrepair, Slonem has found himself drawn to these national landmarks, inspired by the depth of their age and old-world beauty. Among his accomplishments are the restorations of Cordt’s Mansion in Kingston, New York; the Lakeside and Albania plantations of Louisiana; and the Scranton Armory and Charles Sumner Woolworth’s mansion in Scranton, Pennsylvania. His sixth and latest endeavor is Belle Terre, a storied property in South Kortright, New York.
Browse all Fine Art on Incollect.com
C.V. (Resume)
EXHIBITIONS
Upcoming: 2021 New Orleans Museum of Art, New Orleans, LA 2019 San Antonio Museum of Art, San Antonio, Texas * 2018 * 2018 National Museum of the Republic of Kazakhstan, Astana, Kazakhstan Central State Museum of 2018 Kazakhstan, Almaty, Kazakhstan 2018 National Gallery, Sofia, Bulgaria 2018 Ville de St. Tropez 2018 Everhart Museum, Scranton, PA DTR Charlotte 2018 DTR Palm Beach 2018 DTR Boston * 2017 * The State Russian Museum, St. Petersburg, Russia Contemporary Art Museum, Krasnoyarsk, Russia Harmon-Meek Gallery, Naples, FL Galerie Von Stechow - Frankfurt, Germany Rosenbaum Contemporary Art, Boca Raton and Miami, FL Galerie Sono, Norwalk CT Miller Gallery, Cincinnati, OH Gallery 21, Bahrain Martine Chaisson Gallery, Opening/ Book Signing DTR Modern Gallery, Boston, MA Rarity Gallery, Mykonos Greece Tew Galleries, Atlanta, GA Quidley & Co, Nantucket, MA Coats Wright Art and Design, Carmel, Indiana Serge Sorokko Gallery, San Francisco, CA Marywood University, Scranton, PA Madison Galleries, LaJolla, CA Budapest Museum of Fine Arts Weinberger Fine Art, Kansas City, MO McHugh Gallery, Aspen, CO The Ware Family Art Gallery of West Virginia University Russell Collection, Austin, Texas Weinberger Fine Art, Kansas City, MO VW Contemporary Art, Greenwich, CT Madison Galleries, LaJolla, CA New Gallery of Modern Art, Charlotte, NC Space SBH, Carré D’Or, Gustavia, St Barthélemy * 2016 * Cuadro Fine Art, Dubai, UAE The Sultan Gallery, Kuwait City, Kuwait Rarity Gallery, Mykonos, Greece Mattatuck Museum Waterbury, CT Spaces SBH, St. Barthelemy, French West Indies Gremillion Fine Art, Houston, TX Miller Gallery, Cincinnati, OH Galerie Sono, South Norwalk, CT Shaw Center of the Arts, LSU, Baton Rouge, LA Harmon - Meek Gallery, Naples, FL DTR Modern, Palm Beach, FL Russell Collection of Fine Art, Austin, TX Weinberger Fine Art, Kansas City, MO Jessica Hagen Fine Art & Design, Newport, RI Sandra Ainsley Gallery, Toronto, ON Vertu Fine Art, Boca Raton, FL DTR Modern, Boston, MA McHugh Gallery, Aspen, CO Madison Gallery, La Jolla, CA Laura Rathe Fine Art, Dallas, TX Laura Rathe Fine Art, Houston, TX Bayou Teche Museum, New Iberia, LA Martine Chaisson Gallery, New Orleans, LA New Gallery of Modern Art, Charlotte, NC Rosenbaum Contemporary Art, Boca Raton, FL Serge Sorokko Gallery, San Francisco, CA And more...
Collections
Academy Art Museum, Easton, MD Alexandria Museum of Art, Alexandria, LA The Ames Collection, New York, NY American Bar Association, Washington, D.C. American Telephone & Telegraph (195 Broadway), New York, NY ARK Restaurant Corporation, New York, NY The Art Bank, US Department of State, Washington, DC Art Gallery of Nova Scotia, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada Bahrain National Museum, Manama, Bahrain, UAE Bank of America, Charlotte, NC Bass Museum of Art, Miami Beach, FL Bates College Museum of Arts, Lewiston, ME Belger Art Center, Kansas City, MO Bergen Museum of Art & Science, Hackensack, NJ Best Products, Richmond VA Bestype Office Environments, a subsidiary of American Banaco, Paris, France Birmingham Museum of Art, Birmingham, AL Boca Raton Museum of Art, Boca Raton, FL Borough Hall, Brooklyn, NY Bowdoin College Museum of Art, Brunswick, ME Bradbury Gallery, Fowler Center, Arkansas State University, Jonesboro, AR The Presidents Gallery, Brenau University, Gainesville, GA Alexander Brest Museum and Gallery, Jacksonville University, Jacksonville, FL Brooklyn Borough Hall, Brooklyn, NY Brooklyn Historical Society, Brooklyn, NY Bryant Park Grill, New York, NY BVLGARI, New York, NY Children’s Hospital, New Orleans, LA Children’s Museum of Naples, Naples, FL Chrysler Museum of Art, Norfolk, VA Ciano Restaurant, New York, NY Cincinnati Art Museum, Cincinatti, OH Cirque du Soleil, Montreal, Quebec, Canada Citibank, New York, NY City Arts Center, Oklahoma City, OK Clifford Russell, Inc, New York, NY Colby College Museum of Art, Waterville, ME Colegio de Architectos del Ecuador, Quito, Ecuador Columbus Museum of Art, Columbus, OH And more…