Hunt Slonem is an internationally recognized American painter, sculptor, and printmaker. His work has been exhibited in more than 350 galleries and museums worldwide and is represented in over 100 museums, including the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Whitney Museum of American Art, the Miro Foundation, and the New Orleans Museum of Art. He regularly exhibits at both public and private venues around the globe and has received numerous honors and awards, including a MacDowell Fellowship and a National Endowment for the Arts grant. Slonem resides in New York City and Louisiana, where he has notably restored two significant plantations to their original states.
Inspired by nature and his sixty pet birds, Hunt Slonem is best known for his unique Neo-Expressionist oil paintings of bunnies, butterflies, and the tropical birds in his personal aviary. His vibrantly colored canvases are filled with birds rendered in thick brushstrokes. Slonem states, “I was influenced by Warhol's repetition of soup cans and Marilyn, but I’m more interested in applying repetition as a form of prayer... It’s really a form of worship.” According to art critic Roberta Smith of The New York Times, “This witty Formalist strategy meshes the creatures into the picture plane and sometimes nearly obscures them as images, but it also suspends and shrouds them in a dim, atmospheric light that is quite beautiful.” Slonem embraces the ephemeral beauty of nature, a quality that adds a nurturing, spiritual effect to his artwork.
Hunt Slonem has always felt a strong connection to the subjects he represents in his work. As a child, he first felt this affinity for birds while living in Hawaii, which deepened during his time in Central America, inspired by the people’s devotion and spiritual fervor. This fascination continued into adulthood; he not only admires the colorful animals from a distance but also collects exotic birds, which live with him in his New York studio. His lush studio serves as a sanctuary for both the animals and the artist. Slonem's constant companions flit around him all day, aiding him in capturing his immediate surroundings with rhythm and style. The poet and art critic John Ashbery describes Slonem’s depiction of these ephemeral creatures as “dazzling explosions of the variable life around us that need only to be looked at in order to spring into being.” Slonem creates beautiful and surprising scenes that offer a sense of calming joy to those who encounter them.