Philip Hanson

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Philip Hanson

I'm nobody! Who are you? (Dickinson)
2014
oil on canvas
60 x 48 inches

Philip Hanson

He who binds to himself a joy (Blake)
2014
oil on canvas
50 x 42 inches

Philip Hanson

There's a certain slant of light (Dickinson)
2013-2014
oil on canvas
42 x 36 inches

Philip Hanson

I reckon when I count at all (Dickinson)
2014
oil on canvas
60 x 48 inches

Philip Hanson

There's a certain slant of light (Dickinson)
2013-2014
oil on canvas
49 x 42 1/4 inches

Philip Hanson

When, in disgrace with fortune and men's eyes (Shakespeare)
2012-2014
oil on canvas
72 x 60 inches

Philip Hanson

After great pain (Dickinson)
2011-2014
oil on canvas
50 x 46 inches

Philip Hanson

There's a certain slant of light (Dickinson)
2013
oil on canvas
72 x 60 inches

Philip Hanson

The soul selects her own society (Dickinson)
2013
oil on canvas
46 x 36 inches

Philip Hanson

After great pain (Dickinson)
2013
oil on canvas
30 x 20 inches

Philip Hanson

After great pain (Dickinson)
2013
oil on canvas
33 1/2 x 33 1/2 inches

Philip Hanson

A Divine Image: Turquoise Beads (Blake)
2013
oil on canvas
28 x 28 inches

Philip Hanson

A Divine Image: Seraphim (Blake)
2013
oil on canvas
28 x 28 inches

Philip Hanson

A Divine Image: Pink Light (Blake)
2013
oil on canvas
28 x 28 inches

Philip Hanson

Perfection
2013
oil on canvas
16 1/2 x 16 1/2 inches

Philip Hanson

Sonnet 18 (Shakespeare)
2013
oil on canvas
50 x 40 inches

Philip Hanson

Faith in their Alabaster Chamber (Dickinson)
2012
oil on canvas
64 x 45 inches

Philip Hanson

Oval 1
2012
oil on canvas
34 x 24 inches

Philip Hanson

Oval 2
2012
oil on canvas
34 x 24 inches

Philip Hanson

Safe in their Alabaster Chambers (Dickinson)
2011
oil on canvas
18 x 18 inches

Philip Hanson

He whose beauty is past change (St. Thomas Aquinas)
2011
oil on canvas
18 x 18 inches

Philip Hanson

The World is Charged With the Glory of God (Hopkins)
2010
oil on canvas
30 x 30 inches

Philip Hanson

Wild Nights - Wild Nights! (Dickinson)
2010
oil on canvas
60 x 60 inches

Philip Hanson

Wild Nights - Wild Nights! (Dickinson)
2010
oil on canvas
53 x 47 1/2 inches

Philip Hanson

I Like a Look of Agony (Dickinson)
2010
oil on canvas
62 3/4 x 50 inches

Philip Hanson

On a Columnar Self (Dickinson)
2010
oil on canvas
48 x 24 inches

Philip Hanson

Energized Fade
2010
oil on canvas
20 x 10 inches

Philip Hanson

Leaf Gate
2009
oil on canvas
30 x 20 inches

Philip Hanson

When in Disgrace (Shakespeare)
2009
oil on canvas
30 x 20 inches

Philip Hanson

Baroque Stage Set
2009
oil on canvas
20 x 18 inches

Philip Hanson

Baroque Cave
2009
oil on canvas
24 x 24 inches

Philip Hanson

Cosmic Gyre
2009
oil on canvas
33 3/4 x 33 3/4 inches

Philip Hanson

Tell All the Truth (Dickinson)
2008
acrylic gouache and pencil on heavy paper
12 x 10 inches

Philip Hanson

My Life Closed Twice (Dickinson)
2007
oil on canvas
20 x 16 inches

Philip Hanson

Tell All the Truth (Dickinson)
2007
oil on canvas
18 x 18 inches

Philip Hanson

The Bustle in the House (Dickinson)
2007
oil on canvas
18 x 18 inches

Philip Hanson

Lush Lust
2007
oil on canvas
16 x 12 inches

Philip Hanson

So Be It
2007
oil on canvas
18 x 14 inches

Philip Hanson

Rainbow in The Sky (Wordsworth)
2007
oil on canvas
16 x 12 inches

Philip Hanson

Listless Lust
2007
oil on canvas
16 x 12 inches

Philip Hanson

Organ Music I
2007
oil on canvas
10 x 9 inches

Philip Hanson

Organ Music II
2007
oil on canvas
14 x 12 inches

Philip Hanson

Poem without Words: Rose
2007
oil on canvas
16 x 16 inches

Philip Hanson

Poem without Words: Blue Swallows
2007
oil on canvas
16 x 16 inches

Philip Hanson

This is Just to Say (Williams)
2007
oil on canvas
16 x 12 inches

Philip Hanson

Poem without Words: Forest Opening
2007
oil on canvas
18 x 18 inches

Philip Hanson

Poem without Words: Ascending
2007
oil on canvas
18 x 18 inches

Philip Hanson

Poem without Words: Lily
2007
oil on canvas
18 x 16 inches

Philip Hanson

Organ Music II
2007
oil on canvas
14 x 12 inches

Philip Hanson

Red Torso
2006-2007
oil on canvas
20 x 16 inches

Philip Hanson

Framed Niche
2006-2007
oil on canvas
18 x 16 inches

Philip Hanson

Valentine to the Baroque Ceiling
2006-2007
oil on canvas
18 x 18 inches

Philip Hanson

The Heart Asks (Dickinson)
2006-2007
oil on canvas
20 x 16 inches

Philip Hanson

Poem without Words: Diamond Frame
2006-2007
oil on canvas
20 x 18 inches

Philip Hanson

Cartouche
2006-2007
oil on canvas
18 x 18 inches

Philip Hanson

Poem without Words: Leaf Orbits
2006-2007
oil on canvas
18 x 18 inches

Philip Hanson

Poem without Words: Oval
2006-2007
oil on canvas
18 x 18 inches

Philip Hanson

The Heart Asks (Dickinson)
2006-2007
oil on canvas
20 x 16 inches

Philip Hanson

Radiant Torso
2006
oil on canvas
16 x 14 inches

Philip Hanson

Shell Secretion
1992
oil on canvas with artist's painted frame
18 x 12 inches

Philip Hanson

Chambers of the Shell
1977
acrylic on canvas
84 x 66 inches

Philip Hanson

Languid Lake
1969
oil on canvas with sewn canvas
48 x 28 1/2 inches

Philip Hanson

Languid Lake
1969
oil on canvas with sewn canvas
48 x 28 1/2 inches

Philip Hanson

Dappled Pleasure Dress
1969
oil on canvas with sewn canvas
48 x 28 1/2 inches

Philip Hanson

Weave
1969
oil on canvas strips mounted on wood
16 x 16 inches

Philip Hanson

Candy Box: Dreamy
1969
oil on canvas with wooden frame and plastic flower
10 x 10 x 2 1/2 inches

Philip Hanson

Candy Box: Love
c. 1968
oil on canvas with wooden frame and plastic flower
9 1/2 x 9 1/2 x 2 1/2 inches

Philip Hanson

Candy Box: Dear
c. 1968
oil on canvas with wooden frame and plastic flower
8 x 8 x 2 1/2 inches

Philip Hanson

Untitled Entranceway
1969
oil on canvas
20 x 18 inches

Philip Hanson

Shadow Series: Emerging Lady
1968
oil on canvas
12 1/2 x 12 1/2 inches

Philip Hanson

Lady Unveiling
1968
oil on canvas with painted frame
16 5/8 x 16 5/8 inches

Philip Hanson

Camera Lady
1968
oil on canvas with painted frame
13 1/2 x 16 inches

Philip Hanson

Concealing Fan
1968
oil on canvas with painted frame
13 x 12 1/2 inches

Philip Hanson

Shadow Series: Undefined Person
1968
oil on canvas
12 x 14 inches

Philip Hanson

Shadow Series: Undefined Person
1968
oil on canvas
12 x 14 inches

Philip Hanson

Shadow Series: Double Portrait
1968
oil on canvas
12 x 14 inches

Philip Hanson

Shadow Series: Revealing Shadow
1968
oil on canvas
12 x 14 inches

Philip Hanson

Mirrored Entrance
1968
oil on canvas with painted frame
19 1/2 x 19 1/2 inches

BIO

b. 1943

Lives and works in Chicago.

One of the original Imagist artists, Philip Hanson has been a signal Chicago painter since he first came on the scene in the late ’60s. In 1968, in the spirit of the “Hairy Who” exhibitions of the preceding two years, the Hyde Park Art Center mounted a show by a group calling itself “The False Image,” which included Roger Brown, Eleanor Dube, Christina Ramberg and Hanson. Hanson had started painting in college, though he didn’t focus on art until after he received a BA at University of Chicago and spent a year studying architecture at UIC. At the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (where Hanson got his BFA in 1969 and has taught since 1973), Hanson was influenced – like most of the young Imagists – by painter Ray Yoshida, whose interest in popular visual culture (cartoons, especially) and folk art was wildly inspirational.

Hanson’s paintings are often vibrantly colored and intricately patterned. Where his contemporaries have tended towards forthrightly sarcastic or slapstick imagery, Hanson’s visual world tends to be oblique, subtle, multilayered, and sometimes romantic. His early works included a series of candy boxes, decorated with plastic flowers and bearing terse epigrams like “Eternal Passion,” “Dear” and “Dreamy,” as well as investigations of unusually decorated marginal architectural spaces (entranceways, mezzanines), elaborately detailed flowers, and billowing and translucent women’s clothes (including his important “Dappled Pleasure Dress” pieces). Primarily a painter, in the early years he also made etchings, mezzotints and aquatints, hand-coloring the finished prints. During the early ’70s, Hanson created a series of shell-, leaf-, and flower-shaped cloth constructions, built of sewn bits of canvas that were then painted. In subsequent years, Hanson has turned to men’s garments (jackets and codpieces) in his paintings, while another series explored the transformation of one object into another (a bridge into a flower or a conch into a tent, for instance). Over the last decade he has amassed an incredible body of paintings that integrate text, most often poetry, in a union with image that Hanson thinks of as being operatic.

Hanson’s work was featured in a solo retrospective at the Illinois State Museum in Springfield (1985). His recent work was shown at 1926 Exhibition Studies Space (2003). He has been included in group shows at MCA (1969 and 1972); the Institute of Contemporary Art in Philadelphia (1969); the Sao Paulo Biennale (1973); the Chicago Public Library Cultural Center (1977); Shane Campbell Gallery, Oak Park (2012); Karma International, Zurich (2013); and the Whitney Biennial (2014), among many others. His work is in the permanent collections of the MCA, AIC, the National Museum of American Art, Washington, DC, and the Museum des 20 Jahrhunderts, Vienna.

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PDF - Philip Hanson CV

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