Hunt Slonem’s “FOR THE BIRDS”
TrizecHahn is pleased to announce an installation of paintings by artist Hunt Slonem on view in the Lobby at the Grace Building, 1114 Avenue of the Americas.
A striking aspect of these works is the exotic world that Slonem has created and in which he lives and works. He divides his time between two spaces in New York: A floor in an industrial building on the Bowery is alive with hundreds of singing birds and the flashes of light that pass through the prisms of crystal chandeliers hung above Gothic chairs; and Slonem’s second space is a landmark building in Chelsea with 3,000 square feet commanding unobstructed views of the Hudson River and lower Manhattan.
The paintings in this exhibition feature images of birds, flora, and fauna. Slonem started collecting birds when he was 10 years old. He started with parakeets, then parrots; toucans came along as a result of his student travels to South America and Mexico. It was in New York, however, that his passion for collecting birds became an obsession, as well as models for his paintings. His collection includes a wide variety of exotic birds, such as grenadiers, finches, Peter twinspots, Asian orioles, a hunting parrot, hummingbirds, African grays, macaws, troupials, tanagers, hornbills, lilac rollers, and barbacks. Slonem has always used birds to signify the soul as symbolized in Christianity and in the Egyptian Book of the Dead. The cage represents the body.
Originally from Maine, Slonem is a graduate of Tulane University and studied painting at Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture in Skowhegan, Maine. He has exhibited his work since 1977 in major galleries and museums all over the world. His work is in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Tel Aviv Museum, and in many other museum, corporate, and private collections internationally.