Salon Series: Evenings with Hulings
Plugged-In Collecting
If you’ve ever looked at a famous artist and wondered how they did it, beyond the hype, this is your chance for an intimate “fireside” inside-look. We’ll be delighted if you join us as we immerse ourselves in the talent, art, and business practices that make Clark Hulings a beloved and essential American artist. The Salon Series is co-produced by SHIRLEY HOLLAND.
Plugged-In Collecting—Evenings with Hulings Virtual Salon
Thursday, July 14, 2022, 7.00 PM Eastern
A conversation with Jill DeTemple and Gordon O’Brien
This power couple are forward-thinking, business-savvy art collectors. Gordon O’Brien and Jill DeTemple’s involvement in local organizations such as Plein Air Easton and national organizations including Oil Painters of America powers their ongoing relationships with artists and art-making. Their collection ranges from Mian Situ, C.W. Mundy, and Andrew Wyeth, to Tomutsu Takishima—to 19th Century artists such as Léon Augustin Lhermitte. A conversation facilitated by Fine Art Connoisseur editor-in-chief Peter Trippi will explore the expertise collectors can share with one another; tips for buying art online and their thoughts on NFTs; art acquisition as an investment vs. passion; what Jill and Gordon have learned about displaying and storing art; and how artists get on their radar.
PAST EVENTS
The Working Artist in Antiquity—Evenings with Hulings Virtual Salon
How did Roman fresco painters paint? How did patrons and clients in antiquity discover or commission art for their homes? What can contemporary artists learn from the work and the working conditions of painters in other times and places? Join us for a conversation with curator, art historian, and Egyptologist Dr. Clare Fitzgerald of New York University’s Institute for the Study of the Ancient World; and James D. Balestrieri, author of the upcoming Hulings book and the recent Antiques & The Arts Weekly article “Mirror Dimension – ‘Pompeii In Color: The Life of Roman Painting.’ ”
Evenings with Hulings Salon Series— with Stephanie Stebich & Peter Trippi
Stephanie Stebich is the Margaret and Terry Stent Director of the Smithsonian American Art Museum, the final stop on the U.S. tour of Many Wests: Artists Shape an American Idea exhibit. With her extensive experience acquiring and exhibiting art of the American West, Stebich is superbly qualified to explore how artists’ perceptions of this complex region have changed over time. Clark Hulings’ work is woven into the conversation with a look at Woodbearers of Chimayo at The Tacoma Art Museum. Peter Trippi, editor-in-chief of the national magazine Fine Art Connoisseur, moderates this fascinating discussion.
Evenings with Hulings Salon Series— Hulings and 20th Century Realists with Dean Mitchell & Alex McAdams
"Mr. Mitchell is a virtual modern-day Vermeer of ordinary black people given dignity through the eloquence of his concentration and touch." - The New York Times.
The second event in our Salon series features a conversation on our running theme of Hulings and twentieth-century realists—why they matter, their antecedents, heirs, and how they fit in the continuum and canon of American art. Featuring acclaimed painter and CHF Board Member Dean Mitchell, and moderated by painter & CHF Development Coordinator Alex McAdams.
Evenings with Hulings Salon Series—Collectors & Collecting: What artists and the rest of us need to know.
With Peter Trippi, Editor-in-Chief, Fine Art Connoisseur, and special guest, Collector Libby Whipple. The Salon Series is co-produced by Shirley Holland.
ABOUT THE SERIES
This ongoing series explores Clark Hulings’ place in the canon of American art and the continuum of realism. It showcases him as a role model for artists building careers today, and fosters dialogue among collectors, artists, and others throughout the industry. Clark Hulings exemplified what it takes to run a thriving art business, create decades of top-notch work, cultivate rock-solid relationships, and leave a seminal body of work and a road map for today’s creative professionals.
The ingredients of a successful art career are a mix of passion, commitment, skill, business sense, and hard work. We’ll investigate all of these with experts who are deeply familiar with Hulings’ art, life, and legacy. Formats will range from talks, presentations, and demonstrations to interviews and jousts! Delivered live via Zoom, with a limited, invitation-only audience whose questions and insights will be encouraged, each evening will subsequently be edited and released on all of our platforms and promoted widely to our broadest audience.
Beginning in June, 2021, we’ll host a virtual salon each month. Running between 60-90 minutes at cocktail hour, we’ll do sessions with the following themes:
- Key Business Developments—blockchain, Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs), and their definition and place in the art world), shipping, tracking, virtual and augmented reality exhibitions, etc.—led by Elizabeth Hulings and CHF faculty.
- Hulings and 20th Century Realists—why they matter, their antecedents, heirs, and how they fit in the continuum and canon of American art—curated by our Artist-in-Residence, James D. Balestrieri.
- Collectors and Collecting—what artists and the rest of us need to know—led by Peter Trippi, Editor-in-Chief, Fine Art Connoisseur; and Director, President, Projects in 19th Century Art.
Shirley Holland and her husband, Tuffy, both Colorado natives, were deeply invested in the world of Western Art since the mid-1980s. Early purchases of Western Art prints led to purchases of original artwork. Those early purchases led to a deep appreciation of Western Art and the artists who create it—and to the development of an extensive collection featuring works from a wide array of well-known artists. Collecting became an obsession. After the death of her husband in 2016, Shirley remained in her art-filled home in Greeley and enjoys giving mini-tours through her home. At age 87, the goal is becoming deaccessioning rather than accessioning; to that end, several works have already found their way into museums. She enjoys sharing her appreciation of the art with others and stays in contact with many of the artists represented in her collection. Shirley's belief is that art should be shared.
Special thanks to our co-producer Shirley Holland, dba Wilsher Western Art Collection, for her support of Hulings’ Legacy and The Evenings with Hulings Salon Series!
Peter Trippi is editor-in-chief of Fine Art Connoisseur, the magazine that serves collectors of contemporary and historical realist art. He is also president of Projects in 19th-Century Art, a firm he established to pursue research, writing, and curating opportunities. Based in New York City, Trippi directed the Dahesh Museum of Art and co-curated international touring exhibitions devoted to J.W. Waterhouse (1849–1917) and Lawrence Alma-Tadema (1836–1912). His Waterhouse monograph was published by Phaidon Press in 2002, and he authored an essay in the catalogue that accompanied the James Tissot exhibition visiting San Francisco and Paris in 2019–20. His current exhibition, Artful Stories: Paintings from Historic New England, was co-curated with Nancy Carlisle and is on view at the Eustis Estate in Milton, Massachusetts, through October 2021. Trippi is president of the Foundation for Advancement for Conservation and recently finished an eight-year term as president of the Association of Historians of Nineteenth-Century Art.
James D. Balestrieri is the Clark Hulings Foundation’s Writer-in-Residence. He is currently working on a major monograph: Clark Hulings: Quantum Realist. Jim is the proprietor of Balestrieri Fine Arts, a consulting firm that specializes in catalogue research and arts writing, estate and collections management, and marketing and communications for museums and auctions. Jim has a BA from Columbia University, an MA in English from Marquette University, an MFA in Playwriting from Carnegie-Mellon, and was a Screenwriting Fellow at the American Film Institute. He served as Director of J.N. Bartfield Galleries in New York for 20 years and has published over 150 feature essays and reviews in a wide variety of national arts publications. Hear him on The Thriving ArtistTM podcast or watch his Haverford College presentation How Do You Write A Book About an Artist?
As Clark Hulings‘ daughter, Elizabeth Hulings grew up knowing that it is possible for people to earn a living from the creation of art. Before CHF, Elizabeth worked on five Fortune-500 mergers at the predecessors of Citigroup, Cendant, and Verizon Communications. She honed her skills at several nonprofit organizations including the International Development Exchange, The Management Center/Opportunity Knocks, and Human Rights Watch—and then launched her own business-strategy consulting firm, Counterpoise, in 2001. In 2011, she established the Clark Hulings Foundation with her mother, Mary Hulings, to provide visual artists with access to the tools and knowledge that helped her father successfully manage his own art business. Elizabeth has an M.A. in Latin American Studies from Stanford University, and a B.A. in International Relations and History from Tufts University. Read her Director’s View Column, a recent interview in Authority Magazine, or enjoy Freshly Revealed for articles about Hulings’ art.
