Duncan Hannah summons the spirit of a British esthetic throughout his oeuvre. His recurring subjects, drawn from early to mid-century cinema and literature, include vintage sports cars tooling around the English countryside, the reclusive British film star Nova Pilbeam, and his invented group of adventure-book heroes, the Shipwreck Boys.
Read MoreHannah’s paintings offer the viewer quick snapshots of a forgotten past and serve as a meditation of a more fanciful time. In referring to his Penguin Book paperback collection, he comments “I found myself staring at how beautiful they are—it’s the best graphic design I’ve ever seen—and thinking, I wish I could do something with this.” In essence, the artist incorporates elements of Pop and Minimalism while creating narratives and nostalgic scenes that predate those movements.
His paintings are represented in collections both nationally and internationally, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Chicago Art Institute, and Mick Jagger's private collection, to name a few. He is the recipient of the 2011 Guggenheim Fellowship.
