The Year of the BunnyA tribute to Hunt Slonem

The Year of the Bunny
A tribute to Hunt Slonem

Artist Hunt Slonem was born in the year of the rabbit, just like this year. However, this is not the reason that Hunt paints bunnies. Like most characters, they manifested themselves on their own. They cleverly made their way into his paintings first by resting at a saint's feet, then slowly they jumped onto a canvas of their own and multiplied.

Hunt describes himself as blessed without conflict, he always knew who he was going to be, and as a child, he painted himself with an easel. Like Willa Cather in My Ántonia, he sees the rhythm of the universe in the repetition of blades of grass, birds, butterflies, and now ears of bunnies. It isn’t just cute, it’s also serious as it is part of a mantra. Hunt focuses on ritual, mysticism, metaphysical, symbolism, and synchronicity all with a gratitude attitude. This isn’t planned, it just is. He paints bunnies every morning he can. This is all part of a quasi-spiritual practice of the self-described non-category artist.

“The divine can take a form, like leaves on trees or blades of grass”

Hunt doesn’t use the word manifest frequently, he uses pre-destiny but he is a student of Florence Scovel Shinn, having studied her book The Game of Life and How To Play It. I frequently listen to Shinn myself and I was delighted to learn that he is a fan. Slonem is a spiritualist who recognizes the use of repetition or rhythmically repeating words that can focus spiritual energy into creation, this centers the mind on something larger than yourself. As any physicist knows, sound has enormous power.

“Repetition is a good thing, then I can focus on the gesture and the paint and how I want to incorporate other materials and just surprises happen and it’s very random and it seems to come from within.”

Hunt’s canvas sometimes is space itself, meaning he surrounds himself with oversized monochromatic rooms filled with things he loves. Here he lets the divine take form not only in his art but in his everyday habitat. There Gothic revival furniture lives, animals, and gardens flourish. These things are an amalgamation of the sultry air of Louisiana, Mexico, and Hawaii, along with the jungles of Nicaragua all places he has called home. His Hells Kitchen once a stark white building is now filled with collections. It’s hollowed out in its center so that you can peer down from above into the depths of his creations. Out of seven homes to choose from he calls this place home. The building is alive as it is part office, part aviary with tropical birds, part terrarium with orchids, part artist’s studio, and a home. The birds became sort of a self-funded charity that happened by accident, as friends gifted them to him when they could no longer take care of them. Now Slonem has fewer birds than before as they were sent to an organization that has better medical care.

Sloanem also collects homes. They are all historic homes, including an armory. The bigger and the older the home the better. He coveted all his homes before he owned them. They were manifested.

He would call his psychic to tell them about a dwelling and she would say:

“You already own it”

And one day he did. Sloanem lives in his own manifested fairytale. It’s a beautiful thing.
“Man must prepare for the thing he has asked for when there isn't the slightest sign of it in sight.”― Florence Scovel Shinn, The Game of Life and How To Play It.

Slonem has his work in over 250 museums worldwide. Now, he is concentrating on a new manifestation, his larger-than-life bunny sculptures and other macro-art forms.

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