Hunt Slonem has mastered the art of repetition in his exuberant Neo-Expressionist paintings. Some of his favorite subjects are bunnies, butterflies and the tropical birds that live in the private aviary nestled within his 30,000-square-foot studio complex in Brooklyn, New York.
“I believe in repetition like a holy mantra or rosary,” Slonem told Introspective, referring to his artistic method. “I am slightly influenced by Pop art, like the repetition of soup cans, postage stamps and celebrities. It’s something I have been doing my whole life.”
Slonem’s depictions of birds — which are often rendered in thick, gestural brushstrokes and arranged in a loose grid — owe to a fascination with tropical avian life that he developed during a childhood spent in Hawaii and Nicaragua. Today, along with the aviary, his studio contains a personal garden, a collection of antiques and walls and walls of artworks.
“I am a collector of things. My primary focus is color and objects. I love to make them work in a space,” Slonem says. “Sometimes I define a space with color.”
Besides birds, Slonem has painted so many bunnies that they’ve become a signature. Limned in expressive, urgent strokes on flat, vibrantly colored backgrounds, these creatures fascinate through their subtle variations. “I have painted hundreds of rabbits, but each one is different,” the artist has explained. “Each has its own personality, and it just comes through me.”
The multitalented Slonem also sculpts, makes prints, creates installations and restores historic spaces. His work has achieved cult status among collectors and is represented in the permanent collections of such esteemed institutions as the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Slonem has even made an appearance on Real Housewives of New York.
Find original Hunt Slonem paintings, prints and other art for sale on 1stDibs.
Price Upon Request
Flutter Oil Painting of Multicolored Butterflies, Contemporary, Framed
By Hunt Slonem
Located in Laguna Beach, CA
Hunt Slonem’s "Flutter" features eleven, multicolored butterflies set against a soft pale yellow background. Brought to life through the sgraffito technique, a method where Slonem us...
Oil
Price Upon Request
3 Hutch Blue Diamond Painting, Acrylic and Oil, Contemporary, Framed
By Hunt Slonem
Located in Laguna Beach, CA
A wonderful composition of one of Slonem's most iconic subjects, Bunnies. "3 Hutch Blue Diamond" depicts a gestural figure of a group of blue bunnies on a deep cobalt blue background...
Oil, Acrylic
Price Upon Request
Trinity 2 Oil Painting on Wood Panel, Contemporary, Framed, Signed
By Hunt Slonem
Located in White Plains, NY
Hunt Slonem butterfly oil painting 'Trinity 2' 2024. Oil on wood, 13 x 10.5 in. / Frame: 17 x 14.5 in. Signed on back. This painting features t...
Oil, Wood Panel
Price Upon Request
Tulip 7 Oil Painting on Wood Panel, Contemporary, Framed, Signed, 2024
By Hunt Slonem
Located in White Plains, NY
Hunt Slonem 'Tulip 7' 2024. Oil on wood, 10 x 8 in. / Frame: 14.5 x 12.5 in. Signed on back. This painting features a single tulip painted in red with a green stem and leaves over a ...
Oil, Wood Panel
Price Upon Request
Hunt Slonem, Multi-colored Bird Oil painting, 'Finches'
By Hunt Slonem
Located in White Plains, NY
'Finches' by Hunt Slonem, 2022. Oil on canvas, 48 x 48 in. This painting features Slonem's signature finches in white, red, blue, and green on a white background. Considered one of the great colorists of his time, Slonem’s neo-expressionist paintings feature an exuberant and bold, fauvist palette to emphasize his beloved menagerie of animals. Through the application of lavish, lush colors, Slonem’s painterly style continues to be fresh and innovative bordering on Pop Art aesthetics. Depicting his signature motifs of repeating whimsical animal imagery, the artist’s devotion to nature and its inhabitants are apparent. Born in Kittery, Maine in 1951, Hunt Slonem graduated with a Bachelor of Arts degree in Painting and Art History from Tulane University in New Orleans, Louisiana. Slonem later attended the prestigious Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture in Maine, where he was exposed to influential artists from the New York area including Alex Katz, Alice Neel, Richard Estes, Jack Levine, Louise Nevelson and Al Held. This exposure played a pivotal role in Slonem’s artistic career, as it aided in his decision to move to New York in 1973. Since 1977, Slonem has had over 250 solo exhibitions at prestigious galleries. Museums, both domestic and international, have collected his work, among them 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. His work has been exhibited globally, including in Madras, Quito, Venice, Gustavia, San Juan, Guatemala City, Paris, Amsterdam, Madrid, Stockholm, Oslo, Cologne, Tokyo, and Hong Kong. His work has been shown in thirty-one different museums including the Hunter Museum of American Art in Chattanooga, Tennessee, in 1981; the Museo Diocesano d'arte sacra Sant'Apollonia in Venice, Italy, in 1986; the Albany Museum of Art in Albany, Georgia, in 2007; the Istanbul Museum of Modern Art in Istanbul, Turkey, in 2007; Museo de Arte de El Salvador in San Salvador...
Canvas, Oil
Price Upon Request
Tall Witness
By Hunt Slonem
Located in Fairfield, CT
oil on canvas
Canvas, Oil