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HUNT SLONEM

American (b. 1951)

Born in Kittery, Maine, Slonem spent the early part of his art education in the South, first pursuing an undergraduate degree in art at Vanderbilt University in Nashville. He then spent his sophomore year at the University of the Americas in San Andrés Cholula, Puebla, Mexico, and graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in Painting & Art History from Tulane University in New Orleans. He later attended the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture in Maine alongside Alex Katz and Alice Neel.

After graduation, he spent several years in the early 1970s living in Manhattan where he befriended Janet Fish, Andy Warhol, Liza Minnelli and Truman Capote. Hunt soaked up all the glitz, glamour, culture and the undulating beat of New York City. This rich interplay between his early Southern influences and the international vibes of New York informed his rich and diverse palate and the rest shall we say is history.

Slonem is an American painter, sculptor, and printmaker. He is best known for his Neo-Expressionist paintings of butterflies, bunnies, and his tropical birds, often based on a personal aviary in which he has been keeping from 30 to over 100 live birds of various species. Slonem’s playful paintings often depict multiples of the same subject in a loosely composed grid, rendered with gestural brushstrokes and a witty sense of humor. Says acclaimed Metropolitan Museum of Art curator Henry Geldzahler, “Slonem is a painter, a painter’s painter with an enormous bag of technical tricks which become apparent to the viewer the longer he stands before the work.”

Slonem’s paintings and sculptures can be found in several prestigious private and public collections throughout the world including: the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Whitney Museum of American Art, and the National Gallery of Art. His art has been featured in numerous publications throughout the years including the Wall Street Journal, Architectural Digest, and Artforum.